Искусствоед
Theodore Stephanides
Cosmic Cynosure
From far Centaurus sped a mighty craft,
A thing so wondrous that Man would go daft
Simply by tuing to explain its gears
Before being older by a million years.
This ship was packed with... "tourists" shall we say,
Beings different from Man in every way
Except that they, too, liked to roam and see
New worlds with man-like curiosity;
And thus through starry space they steered their flight
At fourteen hundred times the speed of light.
(I know that Einstein says this cana't be done,
But, all the same, they did it just for fun).
The ship was stopped without miscalculation
By making use of anti-gravitation
(Don't ask me how) and outside Saturn's rings
It hung as if attached by unseen strings.
Then, posed on sixteen legs on either side,
A purple-feathered dragoman or guide
Called all tourists to a crystal port
And lectured them in phrases of this sort:
читать дальше
(from "Worlds in a Crucible" 1973)
Cosmic Cynosure
From far Centaurus sped a mighty craft,
A thing so wondrous that Man would go daft
Simply by tuing to explain its gears
Before being older by a million years.
This ship was packed with... "tourists" shall we say,
Beings different from Man in every way
Except that they, too, liked to roam and see
New worlds with man-like curiosity;
And thus through starry space they steered their flight
At fourteen hundred times the speed of light.
(I know that Einstein says this cana't be done,
But, all the same, they did it just for fun).
The ship was stopped without miscalculation
By making use of anti-gravitation
(Don't ask me how) and outside Saturn's rings
It hung as if attached by unseen strings.
Then, posed on sixteen legs on either side,
A purple-feathered dragoman or guide
Called all tourists to a crystal port
And lectured them in phrases of this sort:
читать дальше
(from "Worlds in a Crucible" 1973)