Proper Emotion

Drifting sadly through the void,

the stars grimly contemplate their imposed journey.  

Empty of signposts, phenomena, or other sources of interest,

they find it is yet badly cluttered with quantum dust bunnies

and supernova shrapnel. 

Those brave nuclear reactor chambers

bundled up in gravity-bound plasma

trudge wearily on through the mess of quantum froth,

all the while blasting rays and particles

everywhere into the blackness. 

As they grunt, roll, and spiral onward

in a clunky dance of incomprehensible size and universal length,

they recall the nothingness of their deep past,

and of their infinite future.  

Some remain resolutely single,

others go about in pairs, or groups of pairs and singles

orbiting variously around each other,

and yet others move encumbered by rings of planets,

themselves perhaps encumbered

by their own moons and crawling life forms. 

These dance in their own spiral about a thing

which spirals about a larger thing

spiraling about a larger spiraling sage,

wheeling through the universe

in a silent contemplation

of the stew of miniscule stuffing

which they sadly sweep aside.

On earth the sages follow the stars;

In space the stars follow each other,

Neither stars nor sages knowing exactly where or exactly why,

But continuing onward

And onward

To learn as they go.