One final poem before I make my way westward this evening on a long journey back to the US. My ability to read and respond to your poems may be sporadic during the next few weeks, but I will try to visit (and post a few unposted poems) as my situation permits. Good luck and happy summer to one and all.

Behold The Milky Way
By John Herlihy

Astronomers call it the Milky Way;
I call it a celestial path taken by angels who pray.
Who can imagine such a vision in the sky,
To light up the black night with the question why.
God’s esplanade making its way thru the heavens,
A white river of milk as though by horses driven.
Powdered with stardust to glow at the midnight hour,
Into melancholy hearts down on earth now gone dour.
There is a chill to this promenade of ivory white,
As if snow paved the way of this awesome sight.
A chill that makes the clear night seem colder,
This road once taken would surely make us bolder.

Does the Milky Way ever look down in our direction,
As far civilizations gaze down at our mute reflection?
The light of multiple mirrors to reflect pure intelligence,
With spirit that could match every inch of our own diligence.
Ageless sages stroll along this promenade in flowing robes,
Reading wisdom from scrolls to nearby orbiting globes.
What’s that I hear, a distant voice from this end of heaven,
Making a proclamation bearing the sacred number seven?
Seven hours, seven days, seven years judging from the math,
The Planet Earth is only a blip along the Milky Way’s path.
If truth be told, the Milky Way herself is nothing more,
In a far-reaching universe that claims no visible shore.

Church bells heard on a starry night can only chill our blood,
The birds of Paradise fly across the route of this amazing flood.
White flakes as of snow glitter serenely as stars in the firmament,
To fill our penniless imagination with their dreamy ornament.
What if the dark night were to grow and extinguish all the stars,
Vast would be the night as we walked its empty halls beyond Mars.
Let us not forget that the Milky Way herself is but a droplet,
A 100,000 galaxies across a span of 500 million light years.
The thought reduces the star-gazer to a simple human in tears,
If angels no longer strolled down this avenue of ageless years.
When I peer through my spyglass on earth what do I see?
Millions of stars dancing along a pathway in the eternal sea.