A poem by Simon Smith from his book Waiting for a Hunter's Moon.
Listen to this poem
Wait, stars, as I try to set this straight:
you not only illuminate
the night sky as we navigate
the darkened byways of our lives,
you also somehow orchestrate
our every fear, ambition, love,
to some distant celestial date
far beyond what our understanding may conceive.
Now, winds, whichever way you blow,
in whatever directions you may go,
this much, at least, can be held up as true –
you’ll always find the quickest route,
never going around us but straight through,
so delicately taking us apart
that we never seem to realise how
you’ve laid open the quiet corners of our hearts.
Come, clouds, start your silent advance
and, with your subtle cadences
insinuate those half-imaginings
in shades of what we think we know we saw.
Smudge out a path across the skies
and down the half-lit slopes of dawn.
Come, laden with your inconsistencies.
Colour our waking with your undertones.
