In the Quiet Among the Stars
1992
Inspired by "Star Trek: The Next Generation"
Deep in interstellar hyperspace
driven on a warped forcefield,
we seek the planets of foreign suns
to see what secrets they can yield.
Farther, ever farther, we travel.
Strange new worlds we seek to explore,
seeking new life and new civilizations,
we boldly go where none has gone before.
But it's not the destination that compels us.
It's not the end toward which we reach.
No, it's the voyaging itself that we crave;
for the darkling Void has secrets to teach.
Across the endless vacuum
lightyears wide we've ranged,
listening for ætherial whispers
of that from which we're estranged.
And in that eternal Silence
we feel a deep forlorn,
the sense of something we should have gained
but lost when we were born.
An inexpressible yearning,
much more felt than heard,
is a quiet voice that speaks to us,
though it utters not a word.
But if that tantalizing Other
should touch a lonely soul,
we know beyond a doubt
that the touching would make us whole.
So we trek among the stars,
the galaxy we roam,
trying to grasp the ungraspable
'til Death comes to take us home.
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