Beneath the Dark

Beneath the dark, glittering sky
I watch a meteor flare, then die.
If one chaotic squib of light
perturbs our firmament tonight

do cosmic sums go all awry?
Star-gazing poets don't ask why
or deal in fact; they beautify
raw truth in dialects of delight.
Beneath the dark

glittering sky I know I'll die
someday. So metaphors must lie,
give consolation in our plight:
above, the conundrum of God's light,
the paradise that I decry;
beneath - the dark.

Still in the milieu of New Formalism here, methinks.

 I do like writing in the rondeau form. More enjoyable to write than read? Maybe!  Although it's dated June 2008 the subject matter harks back to six years or so previously. I recall lying on a warm summer's night outside our tent in Camping Pinede, Haute Corse, watching, through a fringe of pine branches, shooting stars zap across the heavens. Beautiful.

Very much  Wystan territory:

A cloudless night like this
Can set the spirit soaring:
After a tiring day
The clockwork spectacle is
Impressive in a slightly boring
Eighteenth-century way.

My effort is a bit of a  'Ronseal poem' - it does exactly what it says on the tin -  maybe I'm edging here step by step from lapsed believer to settled atheist, but not quite there yet....



I wish I'd taken this..actually it was astrophotographer Tunc Tezel.