IN NEPTUNE'S REALM

IN NEPTUNE'S REALM

Between pale Uranus and frigid-bleak

Pluto drowned in night, far-flung Neptune steers

His great globe of gaseous blue in a wide

Orbit on the Solar System's cold black

Ocean, an endless voyage thus decreed

To circumnavigate the distant sun

Every three hundred years-- but not alone;

For with him journey Triton and Nereid,

Two moons attracted by that world and one

Another, following their courses round

The giant planet whose seething methane

Rages in perpetual storm, a sea

Untamed and unexplored.

It seems Nereid is shy, a world profound

In mystery, and difficult to see,

While Triton is more strange: in retrograde

His orbit runs, as though he yearns to meet

Nereid and cross her path; and when they pass,

Who knows what secret thrills are felt and laid

Upon the hearts of those who are cognate

In both desire and name?

Ah, let them guess. . .

~ Stanley ~

More Poems By Stanley

Home