Before the year ends

Orion

<>

Meissa, Bellatrix, Betelgeuse

Rigel, Saiph

Alnilam, Mintaka, Alnitak

Tabit, Ensis, Hatsya[1]

<>

Supergiants’ hero hunter

leaping from a toe-hold on

the winter-circle

into the turning year’s early dark

<>

Meissa, Bellatrix, Betelgeuse

Rigel, Saiph

Alnilam, Mintaka, Alnitak

Tabit, Ensis, Hatsya

<>

Cosmic womaniser:

striding in bright heart-leaps[2]

to drunken transgressions and blindness

till sunlight restored you

to boasts and battles

at last to death by insect and transformation

<>

Meissa, Bellatrix, Betelgeuse

Rigel, Saiph

Alnilam, Mintaka, Alnitak

Tabit, Ensis, Hatsya

<>

Neither fickleness nor vanity

diminish your light across more than

a million years of milky-way -

in either hemisphere  you are

bright and dependable

directing the night-sky home

<>

Meissa, Bellatrix, Betelgeuse

Rigel, Saiph

Alnilam, Mintaka, Alnitak

Tabit, Ensis, Hatsya

<>

In other tongues  you are

Luminous shepherd or

Wanderer

with three kings (or sisters) at

Your belt (or pan) –  either way

<>

Meissa, Bellatrix, Betelgeuse

Rigel, Saiph

Alnilam, Mintaka, Alnitak

Tabit, Ensis, Hatsya

<>

there is within you somewhere

a lap of magnificent  nebular confusion,

where stars are born

herded in tales across the vast dark

tracing

the luminous miles

between story

and measurement

<>

Meissa, Bellatrix, Betelgeuse

Rigel, Saiph

Alnilam, Mintaka, Alnitak

Tabit, Ensis, Hatsya

<>

by which mind and heart

try to close the distances

between one mystery

and the next

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[1] The names of the stars in the constellation of Orion

[2] The luminosity of stars is measured on the Hertzsprung-Russel scale

~ by Reason plays no part on December 31, 2010.