“For small creatures such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love.”

–Carl Sagan

 

The vastness, that great big everything

will swallow you at some point,

but you must not view this as failure

or weakness, fellow small creature;

this is what vastness is supposed to do,

and to struggle against it is to spit

in the eye of mystery and surrender

your curiosity, it is to hurl the kaleidoscope

of wonder into a merciless void

and send your life marching barefoot

across a prickly desert.

But with love, that overused word

with underused potential, with the lamp

of love you will see that being engulfed

by vastness is not only bearable, it is

an adventure that will blast your soul

into the jungle of discovery, from where you,

fellow small creature, will never want to leave.