The distances
you traversed in space
put you up there
with the immortals
but then you remember
standing alone
on a bare rocky planet
encased in a suit,
and you felt like
the tiniest, most fragile,
of creatures,
so far from other life forms
it was as if you’d been
abandoned by them,
the sky unfamiliar,
the air poisonous.
the ground barren,
and you,
one crack in glass,
one tear of fabric,
away from death.
Going home
was like emerging from the grave,
a hero maybe
but a resurrected one.
About the Author
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in New World Writing, North Dakota Quarterly and Lost Pilots. Latest books, ”Between Two Fires”, “Covert” and “Memory Outside The Head” are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in California Quarterly, Seventh Quarry, La Presa and Doubly Mad.
