Book Three: 19
Drawn in outer space
on a ceiling of night,
a hinged balance held true.
That balance
—its mechanisms
worked into the unknown—
emerged
in the star systems
which turn in union
without history
as we know it
on this planet.
I recognize it
to the East
said I to the West,
not made,
not given,
over the world.
Devoted observers,
it seems to me
a just structure.
And my search
for peace underground
now come to an end
—constraints accepted
in spirit as well as in letter,
the line spent,
the theatres in abandon—
I viewed the balances
more clearly than ever before.
Copyright Credit: Srikanth Reddy, “Book Three: 19” from Voyager. Copyright © 2011 by Srikanth Reddy. Reprinted by permission of University of California Press.
Source: Voyager (University of California Press, 2011)