Exchange Poem by Gabrielle Ciarann Roniyah Baer

I can't imagine a moonless world
(Illogical, Lieutenant, Vulcan has none.)

I've yet to see a thousand alien worlds.
(alien, Lieutenant, is a relative term.)

I have been reaching all my life
for unseen, unimagined stars.
(a human's reach, must, it seems, exceed their grasp. Yes, Lieutenant, I've read Browning, too.)

I want to hear their music,
dark, precise, and fiery cold as you,
who say you've never heard the stars sing.


written in Jan '78