Digital Astronomy
'What would this man? Now upward will he soar,
And little less than angel, would be more'
-Pope, Essay on Man
It is not proper for a man to be among
stars, and that is why I only dream of them,
luminous balls of plasma-for science
has told me what they are-enfolding me
in their embrace. I am exhausted.
I think light matters. It fills my empty spaces-
pastels, angles, pixel-dust-landscapes
unearthed and not created. I take 'from
the old masters like Goya, Gainsborough,
El Greco', and give all of myself to you.
Cosmonaut and time-traveller, 'I can step
back into previous states at any time',
watch the universe curdle into being on
a blank slate. I can illustrate the celestial
map in so many words. Will you listen?
I send out satellites in search of Gauguin,
Gaudi, God. They leave me with nothing
but mirrors and film: 'The perfect body and
the perfect head are rarely to be found on the
same negative', but I will keep attempting.
Perhaps this 'God is in the details', perhaps
the image of myself is all I can leave
behind. When this portrait is done, I too
will disappear in a flash of light, I will never
have existed. Among the stars, 'I am replete'.
.
Written for Microcosmos, the Ceriph art-writing collab thing. My piece is based primarily on Jack Youngblood's 'The Exhausted Spaceman'. Google it and see!
Posted via LiveJournal.app.