A Space Exploration Celebration!

Hello everyone –

The month of July is a great time to reflect on the first six decades of space exploration:

·        July 20, 1969 = Apollo 11 (first Moon landing)

·        July 20, 1976 = Viking 1 probe lands on Mars

·        July 15, 2015 = First flyby of Pluto by the New Horizons probe

Here are some poems and reflections to help us remember the past and build the future of space exploration!

Fungi from Yuggoth (A Sonnet Cycle)

By H. P. Lovecraft (1890-1937)

[Editor’s Note: Yuggoth is the name of Pluto in HPL’s “weird fiction” and poetic writings.]

Sonnet XIV: “Star-Winds”

It is a certain hour of twilight glooms,

Mostly in autumn, when the star-wind pours

Down hilltop streets, deserted out-of-doors,

But shewing early lamplight from snug rooms.

The dead leaves rush in strange, fantastic twists,

And chimney-smoke whirls round with alien grace,

Heeding geometries of outer space,

While Fomalhaut peers in through southward mists.

This is the hour when moonstruck poets know

What fungi sprout in Yuggoth, and what scents

And tints of flowers fill Nithon’s continents,

Such as in no poor earthly garden blow.

Yet for each dream these winds to us convey,

A dozen more of ours they sweep away!

“If Only We Had Taller Been”

By Ray Bradbury (November 1971)

Written in Commemoration of the Mariner 9 Space Probe Achieving Orbit Around Mars

(Recited at New Horizons Mission Control in July 2015)

The fence we walked between the years

Did bounce us serene

It was a place half in the sky where

In the green of leaf and promising of peach

We'd reach our hands to touch and almost touch the sky

If we could reach and touch, we said,

'Twould teach us, not to, never to, be dead

We ached and almost touched that stuff;

Our reach was never quite enough.

If only we had taller been

And touched God's cuff, His hem,

We would not have to go with them

Who've gone before,

Who, short as us, stood as they could stand

And hoped by stretching tall that they might keep their land

Their home, their hearth, their flesh and soul.

But they, like us, were standing in a hole

O, Thomas, will a Race one day stand really tall

Across the Void, across the Universe and all?

And, measured out with rocket fire,

At last put Adam's finger forth

As on the Sistine Ceiling,

And God's hand come down the other way

To measure man and find him Good

And Gift him with Forever's Day?

I work for that

Short man, Large dream

I send my rockets forth between my ears

Hoping an inch of Good is worth a pound of years

Aching to hear a voice cry back along the universal mall:

We've reached Alpha Centauri!

We're tall, O God, we're tall!

“Where My Heart Will Take Me”

(Theme from Star Trek: Enterprise)

Lyrics by Diane Warren

It's been a long road, getting from there to here.

It's been a long time, but my time is finally near. 

And I will see my dream come alive at last. I will touch the sky.

And they're not gonna hold me down no more, no they're not gonna change my mind.

Cause I've got faith of the heart.

I'm going where my heart will take me. 

I've got faith to believe. I can do anything. 

I've got strength of the soul. And no one's gonna bend or break me. 

I can reach any star. I've got faith, faith of the heart.

Editor’s Note: You can watch the opening sequence of STAR TREK: ENTERPRISE here, featuring the theme song as performed by Russell Watson:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPn-lTytfGo

Apollo 11 Plaque Inscription

HERE MEN FROM THE PLANET EARTH FIRST SET FOOT UPON THE MOON JULY 1969, A.D.

WE CAME IN PEACE FOR ALL MANKIND.

(Signatures: Armstrong, Collins, Aldrin, Nixon)

Ad astra per aspera! (Latin) = To the stars through striving!

(NASA’s Official Motto)

Rob

By Request: More Verses About the Fair Folk

Hello everyone –

I was delighted with the overwhelming response to the last edition of Quotemail, which featured poems about the Fair Folk and their Midsummer Eve revels! I received emails from several listmembers asking for more poems about the Fair Folk, so here’s a trio of poetical selections from famous authors of the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries.

“Fairy Song” (Excerpted from Flower Fables, 1855)

By Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888)

The moonlight fades from flower and tree,

And the stars dim one by one;

The tale is told, the song is sung,

And the Fairy feast is done.

The night-wind rocks the sleeping flowers,

And sings to them, soft and low.

The early birds erelong will wake:

‘Tis time for the Elves to go.

        

O’er the sleeping earth we silently pass,

Unseen by mortal eye,

And send sweet dreams, as we lightly float

Through the quiet moonlit sky;--

For the stars’ soft eyes alone may see,

And the flowers alone may know,

The feasts we hold, the tales we tell:

So ‘tis time for the Elves to go.

        

From bird, and blossom, and bee,

We learn the lessons they teach;

And seek, by kindly deeds, to win

A loving friend in each.

And though unseen on earth we dwell,

Sweet voices whisper low,

And gentle hearts most joyously greet

The Elves where’er they go.

        

When next we meet in the Fairy dell,

May the silver moon’s soft light

Shine then on faces gay as now,

And Elfin hearts as light.

Now spread each wing, for the eastern sky

With sunlight soon will glow.

The morning star shall light us home:

Farewell! for the Elves must go.

“The Flowers” (Excerpted from A Child’s Garden of Verses, 1885)

By Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894)

All the names I know from nurse:

Gardener’s garters, Shepherd’s purse,

Bachelor’s buttons, Lady’s smock,

And the Lady Hollyhock.

Fairy places, fairy things,

Fairy woods where the wild bee wings,

Tiny trees for tiny dames—

These must all be fairy names!

Tiny woods below whose boughs

Shady fairies weave a house;

Tiny tree-tops, rose or thyme,

Where the braver fairies climb!

Fair are grown-up people’s trees,

But the fairest woods are these;

Where, if I were not so tall,

I should live for good and all.

“Did You Ever?”

By Evaleen Stein (1863-1923)

Did you ever see a fairy in a rose-leaf coat and cap

Swinging in a cobweb hammock as he napped his noonday nap?

Did you ever see one waken very thirsty and drink up

All the honey-dew that glimmered in a golden buttercup?

Did you ever see one fly away on rainbow-twinkling wings?

If you did not, why, how comes it that you never see such things?

Please feel free to send me requests for poems on various topics of interest to you, and I’ll be happy to delve into my resources and bring some forth for you in an upcoming edition of Quotemail! :)

Happy weekend –

Rob