we come from the shadows and are three voids
silent and speaking of our port cerebria
sparkling with eucalypts and the calls of birds
and diviners of several classes
arrayed in pastel houses by the shore
their mottos inscribed on jostling placards like sails,
presenting to arriving vessels
(their crews expectant,
wearied by winds and the tide)
their lore –
we speak of the understandings of the diviners
who toil by night
plotting routes, predicting outcomes of voyages
significances of long journeys taken to distant ports
recording the paths of comets that flare in our skies at night
this knowledge we are entrusted to protect
apply in our peregrinations
soothsayings
dances of celestial reckoning
our utterances
footwork and gesture
nuances of comportment
understandings of the raybursts that last a billion years
then die; our sun –
the black holes’ collapses
intergalactic dust shuffles
(our galaxy one speck)
the incomprehensible immensity of reality
incomparable triviality of our affairs
on the exquisite terrible mote our earth
seeing again the comets passing over
the timeless scripts of authority
lost in material survival
painful and weeping selfhoods
choices to live as beasts instead of seers