The surface of the earth is
The Shore of the Cosmic Ocean—²
Suffering humans meet face to face with
The massive Indifference of the Universe—³
Human purposes are pursued within an Immense
Circling Universe, which has no Purpose at all …⁴
We lost a World the other day,
Has anybody found?
You’d know it by the row of Stars
Around its forehead bound.⁵
We dance around a Black Hole—
And pray it’s a Portal!⁶
Here we are: plummeting through a Universe
That created us from Shattering & Dust.⁷
Let earth unbalanc’d from her orbit fly—
Planets & Suns run lawless thro’ the sky!⁸
Earthseed is what spreads Earthlife to new earths:
Its Destiny is to take root among Stars:⁹
The human Spirit is nourished by
Giving them the Cosmos to suckle.¹⁰
¹ Ursula K. Le Guin, Paradises Lost
² Carl Sagan, Shores of the Cosmic Ocean
³ Jimmy Pappas, At My Stepmother’s Deathbed, Twice
⁴ Alan Watts, This Is It
⁵ Emily Dickinson, I Lost a World
⁶ Adrienne Maree Brown, Emergent Strategy
⁷ Dorianne Laux, Third Rock From the Sun
⁸ Alexander Pope, Epistle 1
⁹ Octavia Butler, Parable of the Sower
¹⁰ Francis Ponge tr. Beth Archer, The Silent World Is Our Only Homeland