The Explorer
Ah, explorer! Why are you
not far away, on a ship
covering great ocean’s
breadth, seeing new peoples
and listening to unknown
tongues, studying the
vast wastes of planet,
traversed by humans yet?
Yea, glob reveals all
there is to tell, and every map
combines work and legacy
of so many men, who
even crossed over both the
world’s poles, the empires
of ice that made them
unconquerable till our age.
Do you accept concession
of this planet? This rock
so neatly contained within
these drawings, with
no secret left to tell?
What of the summits untouched
that lay beneath the
oceans, and the seas of rock below them?
Who spoke that you shall
have air and water were you
shall go? Who said warmth
and comfort awaited him
who goes into the world?
Who said you shall carry your
foot and hand so far as to
touch the things you’ll discover?
For you mount a different
helm, and speak in new tongue
of command: you are
captain of crewless ship, worked
by men light-leaps away,
which you doth govern with
light’s meaning that moves
its masts and solar sails.
Your ocean now is void of
space, which you will never
feel, but one which holds
peril for thine vessel, so vested
with the labor and travel
of generations, which holds only
key to domains beyond our
own, the rest of unknown universe.
You can make no mistake,
lest your life languish with loss
of vision for humanity,
that which even in the fraction
of reality hast seen
unreal beauty: oceans sealed by crust
of ice, orbs made of pure
diamond, life in foreign language writ.
Witness, Columbus! From
heaven peer Cook and Amundsen
upon your son, who
ventures as Admiral of the Milky Galaxy
into worlds so ancient,
they doth show only faintest spark in sky!
Bless him, and with them
us, and draw wonder from his chart.
Let his report, even if
link is lost or beyond the echo of light,
or mutinies and carries
human legacy as monument for those
far beyond and far from
now, inspire in us wonder to be great,
to build a metropole of
God, Whose Genius guides us still
upon
seas endless and far away.
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