We spend our lives making an attempt to see our personal mild, to catch its shocking refractions on the face of the world, to play in its waterfalling golden blue radiance till we’re able to lie down within the brilliant black of time as the celebs go on spinning, their fractured hieroglyphics encoding the reminiscence and thriller of being alive.

Sarah Williams — one of many 5 fantastic ladies in my intergenerational poetry group — gives a shimmering set of directions for the way to try this in her splendid poem “How one can See the Milky Manner,” learn right here by Rose Hanzlik — the youngest member of our constellation — to the sound of Mozart’s “Moonlight Sonata” towards a portray of the Milky Manner by Étienne Trouvelot.

HOW TO SEE THE MILKY WAY
by Sarah Williams

Journey far
from crowds. Depart
lit locations that yellow the sky.

Our bodies of water assist.
Decide a cloudless evening,
a brand new moon.

Discover a place to relaxation your head,
maybe on somebody’s chest,
their coronary heart holding time.

Or float in nonetheless water
flecked with stars
rippling round you.

Nonetheless you arrive
parallel to earth and sky,
settle your eyes of their mushy sockets and wait.

Lookup.
Disregard the march of satellites,
their plotted strains.

Linger right here.
Drink speckled mild
from billions of neighboring stars.

Some nights your life is like this.

Couple with “The Complete of It” by Hannah Fries — one other of the 5 ladies in our poetry group — then revisit Ellen Bass’s lifeline of a poem “Any Frequent Desolation,” which has been an ongoing inspiration to all of us.