Empyrean

[ex-fireandea353.livejournal.com]

Empyrean

Endlessly not heaven the sky
Goes on and on and the problem
With human life is that
Although there is nothing
Behind the blue but more
Blue we can’t see as far
As it goes. Or if we had a ship
We can’t go there, although
It’s the same as here
So who cares?

Or if we had a rocket we can’t
Go there. Or if we had a rocket
And a thousand years.
Or if we could ride a light ray
And had a thousand
Thousand years and our cells
Never broke down and our hearts
Never broke down and our eyes
Stayed fixed on that far blue,
Which isn’t blue, and didn’t dim

For a thousand thousand years—
Still we could never go there
And even if we could land
On that final blue beach,
Then what? Your cells would burst
At last, your heart break
Remembering me gone mortal
So long ago and so far away,
As mine breaks now, bearing this
Immensity of blue.

--Mary Baine Campbell