#AtoZChallenge ‘T’ #NationalPoetryMonth ‘Telescope’ by Louise Gluck #amwriting #poem

This year to celebrate National Poetry Month and to take part in the April A-Z Blogging Challenge, I’ll be posting two poems a day, one written by me and another poem written by one of my favourite poets. The title or first word of both poems will begin with the corresponding letter in the Blogging Challenge.

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Today I bring you two poems about the vastness of the universe, perspective and loneliness. Telescope by Louise Gluck and Closer by Luccia Gray.

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Telescope by Louise Glück

 

There is a moment after you move your eye away

when you forget where you are

because you’ve been living, it seems,

somewhere else, in the silence of the night sky.

You’ve stopped being here in the world.

You’re in a different place,

a place where human life has no meaning.

You’re not a creature in a body.

You exist as the stars exist,

participating in their stillness, their immensity.

Then you’re in the world again.

At night, on a cold hill,

taking the telescope apart.

You realize afterward

not that the image is false

but the relation is false.

 

You see again how far away

each thing is from every other thing.

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Louise Gluck reminds us things are not as they seem. The telescope helps us see something closer, but it’s only a temporary fancy. The telescope doesn’t make things bigger or bring them closer, it only creates the false appearance of closeness. Telescope is all about perspectives, how things we look at can seem near and yet be far away or vice versa. However, the poem is also about solitude and loneliness. The final line is tragic, the vast universe makes us think about how distant and alone we are as a planet and as individuals.

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Closer by Luccia Gray

Long black nights

Stars shining

Brighter

Make a wish

Calling dreams  

Closer

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