I saw the picture

that Voyager II sent,

looking back

on our entire solar system,

on its escape into the unprecedented

of the unprecedented

- and looking hard

I managed, with guidance,

to make out a tiny dot,

no more than a speck of dust

that I intuitively wanted to brush off

the photograph

That is us

That is our Earth

and that is the truth

Just a sigh from a tired god

or the unruliness of a passing rock

would liberate a later photo

of that speck

Does this make ourselves more or less

significant?

To whom?

To ourselves?

It must mean something

that our generation

actually CAN see itself,

its circumstances,

its truth,

like this,

physically

on a photograph

by its scout Voyager

glancing back,

finding a speck of dust

We are vulnerable,

at the mercy,

granted the outrageous poetry

of this glance

at ourselves,

forcefully pulling us

out of our nearsightedness,

into our jubilant,

helpless

vulnerability

My ear sings to me,

it's Nantucket song,

and there is someone to hear it,

and that is me,

whoever that is