"All that mankind has done, thought, gained or been: it is lying as in magic preservation in the pages of books."
-Thomas Carlyle

by Daniel Morgan

In these latter days the fulsome Moon,
Less chaste now than those golden days,
Draws the sea and hapless mortal too
'Neath night's cloak and maria of grey.

Brass explorers of a bygone day
Caught Selene in sepia squares,
Mapped down the golden lines of far Cathay,
But lost the pearl they thought was theirs.

But let Selene defend her argent face,
Seduce and claim her conquerors.
For I am one of Actaeon's race,
And bound for less deep-starry shores.

Though the ocean's heart is dead at last,
Its moonshine leads men to the sky.
And men are wont to raise a silver mast,
And fall for Eve's ancient love-lie.

My silence this hour would be treasonous:
The Moon is not worth fighting for.
She is not the lowly shepherd's goddess,
But a dream wrapped in deceitful war.

And war is naught but desire unruled,
That scrapes life out with blunt fingernails,
While this present world is no less marled
With science, proofs, and empowered girls.

Between the knight-time fancies of the past
And sterile daydreams we cannot quell,
Those who wished the mystery might last
Have failed to slake the yonic Grail.

But we are only broken bits,
Potsherds meant to sooth the scars
Of Him who felt our piercing nails
And from clay feet He forged us stars.