Three Pieces
Kirsty Mac Dougall
Celestial Magic
The first sparkle in the sky
framed by the window behind my desk
sprinkles her lustre dust over the end of a basic afternoon
drawing the curtains of the day closed
to unbox the magic of early evening.
Though it’s all a lie—
we all know this is no star.
She doesn’t even twinkle.
Instead, she beams a constant shine
like eyes before the prize
spirited and sprightly
though slightly out of place against sodalite skies
still glowing with the embers of sunset.
Yet, here she gleams
out at a time when she should still be in bed
waiting for the alarm chimes of the third-quarter moon
before putting up a dazzling display
with the rest of her cosmos family.
But here Venus stands
the celestial rebel
manning night’s lighthouse
alone in the watchtower
until she’s slowly joined by her neighbours and distant cousins.
Unhurried shades of darkness replace daylight
and all its prosaic demands
until we’re finally enrobed in a wondrous black sky
sequinned with the most precious gems:
a field of uncountable stars
blooming in full darkness.
All this ushered in by a single body
beaming more brilliantly than the rest—
one rogue planet
and all her celestial magic.
The Heavens, in Wonder
When we look to the night sky
is it not always in awe
of the vast greatness—
the endless depths of darkness
holding all of life’s mysteries
like a fishbowl around us?
When we look to the stars
is it not always in wonder
of their pendant lights—
travelling beams from a billion miles away
holding the wisdom of billions of years
like an ancient archive above us?
When we speak of the heavens
is it not always in mythical tales
of the people of the sky—
the gods of benevolence
holding the fortune of mankind
like a crystal ball before us?
As I look to the skies, I wonder
while you wonder something else
and we tell ourselves stories of the stars
to explain it all—
while the heavens stare in awe
of the billions of eyes shining below
in wonder of our wonder—
never knowing the billions of stories
we tell of them.
Our Space in Perspective
In wonder of the view below
the dots
of shoes
of tiny
walking
figures
remind us of the v a s t n e s s of the world
and
the fleck
of space
we hold
in it.
Though we feel proud as mountains
stand tall and graze the heavens
and with the s t r e t c h of an arm
pick
stars
from
the
sky.
Armed with love and contentment, we fill the universe
and
watch
the
match-
stick
men
below
praising the heavens for the stars we hold in our hands.
Kirsty has loved writing in all its forms and glory since childhood. Her poetry follows a stream-of-consciousness process that she uses to make sense of the world—and herself. Kirsty’s work has appeared in Free the Verse, Poets Online, and WordSwell. She lives with her cat in Johannesburg, South Africa.