The Sky Full Of Stars

The neighbours gossiped idly at the door.

Copernicus lay dying overhead.

His little throng of friends, with startled eyes,

Whispered together, in that dark house of dreams,

From which by one dim crevice in the wall

He used to watch the stars.

"His book has come

From Nuremberg at last; but who would dare

To let him see it now?"-

"They have altered it!

Though Rome approved in full, this preface, look,

Declares that his discoveries are a dream!"-

"He has asked a thousand times if it has come;

Could we tear out those pages?"-

"He'd suspect."-

"What shall be done, then?"-

"Hold it back awhile.

That was the priest's voice in the room above.

He may forget it. Those last sacraments

May set his mind at rest, and bring him peace."-

Then, stealing quietly to that upper door,

They opened it a little, and saw within

The lean white deathbed of Copernicus

Who made our world a world without an end.

There, in that narrow room, they saw his face

Grey, seamed with thought, lit by a single lamp;

They saw those glorious eyes

Closing, that once had looked beyond the spheres

And seen our ancient firmaments dissolve

Into a boundless night.

Beside him knelt

Two women, like bowed shadows. At his feet,

An old physician watched him. At his head,

The cowled Franciscan murmured, while the light

Shone faintly on the chalice.

All grew still.

The fragrance of the wine was like faint flowers,

The first breath of those far celestial fields….

Then, like a dying soldier, that must leave

His last command to others, while the fight

Is yet uncertain, and the victory far,

Copernicus whispered, in a fevered dream,

"Yes, it is Death. But you must hold him back,

There, in the doorway, for a little while,

Until I know the work is rightly done.

Use all your weapons, doctor. I must live

To see and touch one copy of my book.

Have they not brought it yet?

They promised me

It should be here by nightfall.

One of you go

And hasten it. I can hold back

Death till dawn.

Have they not brought it yet?-from Nuremberg.

Do not deceive me. I must know it safe,

Printed and safe, for other men to use.

I could die then. My use would be fulfilled.

What has delayed them? Will not some one go

And tell them that my strength is running out?

Tell them that book would be an angel's hand

In mine, an easier pillow for my head,

A little lantern in the engulfing dark.

You see, I hid its struggling light so long

Under too small a bushel, and I fear

It may go out forever. In the noon

Of life's brief day, I could not see the need

As now I see it, when the night shuts down.

I was afraid, perhaps, it might confuse

The lights that guide us for the souls of men.

But now I see three stages in our life.

At first, we bask contented in our sun

And take what daylight shows us for the truth.

Then we discover, in some midnight grief,

How all day long the sunlight blinded us

To depths beyond, where all our knowledge dies.

That's where men shrink, and lose their way in doubt.

Then, last, as death draws nearer, comes a night

In whose majestic shadow men see God,

Absolute Knowledge, reconciling all.

So, all my life I pondered on that scheme

Which makes this earth the centre of all worlds,

Lighted and wheeled around by sun and moon

And that great crystal sphere wherein men thought

Myriads of lesser stars were fixed like lamps,

Each in its place,-one mighty glittering wheel

Revolving round this dark abode of man.

Night after night, with even pace they moved.

Year after year, not altering by one point,

Their order, or their stations, those fixed stars

In that revolving firmament. The Plough

Still pointed to the Pole. Fixed in their sphere,

How else explain that vast unchanging wheel?

How, but by thinking all those lesser lights

Were huger suns, divided from our earth

By so immense a gulf that, if they moved

Ten thousand leagues an hour among themselves,

It would not seem one hair's-breadth to our eyes.

Utterly inconceivable, I know;

And yet we daily kneel to boundless Power

And build our hope on that Infinitude.

This did not daunt me, then. Indeed, I saw

Light upon chaos. Many discordant dreams

Began to move in lucid music now.

For what could be more baffling than the thought

That those enormous heavens must circle earth

Diurnally-a journey that would need

Swiftness to which the lightning flash would seem

A white slug creeping on the walls of night;

While, if earth softly on her axle spun

One quiet revolution answered all.

It was our moving selves that made the sky

Seem to revolve. Have not all ages seen

A like illusion baffling half mankind

In life, thought, art? Men think, at every turn

Of their own souls, the very heavens have moved.

Light upon chaos, light, and yet more light;

For-as I watched the planets-Venus, Mars,

Appeared to wax and wane from month to month

As though they moved, now near, now far, from earth.

Earth could not be their centre. Was the sun

Their sovran lord then, as Pythagoras held?