Lit eZine Vol 5 | p-11 | POETRY | Even The Poor Have Stars To Guide Them – Manic Sylph Writes… Poetry & Thoughts by Mona Soorma

SHORT POEM

EVEN THE POOR HAVE STARS TO GUIDE THEM
by John Grey

Man watching the night sky and the moon — *Image by* *Ricky2001*

All we had some nights was the sky –
	far stars, near stars,
	some already dead but you’d never know it
	a few just born 
	and getting their information out.
I remember that
from many evening staring high,
taking in all that light,
	watching the Milky Way
	make heaven of itself,
	with a cold, hard pale moon
	as an example 
	of what not to be.
Eyes gaped as much as mouths,
we even saw ourselves in them,
no longer above our heads
but a pool of plasma
as prickly as grass,
warm and bedsheets,
and no need to go beyond the home
to have it all.
	Falling stars.
	Small stars.
	Giant stars.
	Stars that were not stars
	but gave out just as good.
Any night,
Ursa Major, Ursa Minor, 
were true,
the stuff we were born from
and always there somewhere.
We looked up.
Why not?
Consider the alternative.

John Grey is an Australian poet and US resident, recently published in New World Writing, North Dakota Quarterly and Lost Pilots. His latest books, ”Between Two Fires”, “Covert” and “Memory Outside The Head” are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in California Quarterly, Seventh Quarry, La Presa and Doubly Mad.