11:3: “Launching Atlantis”, by Ann K. Schwader

Posted by ideomancer on Sep 1st, 2012 in poetry, Vol. 11, Vol. 11 Issue 3 | 1 comment

Already half a legend, it ascends on fire & breathless science into skies which opened at the heartbreak moment. Child of compromise, it falters — shivers — then shakes off our doubts, as oceans far below receive its rockets like outriggers lost by refugees from other waves that rocked their world to myth.           Did these who died unknown (aside from Plato’s fables) understand too late their stars had vanished? Or did they take up the plow, the loom, the sword . . . the screen, embracing the mundane? An eagle landed visions for us, too, before times changed. We now resume our slow retreat from dream.

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Ann K. Schwader is the author of Twisted in Dream (Hippocampus Press, 2011), Bram Stoker Award finalist Wild Hunt of the Stars (Sam’s Dot, 2010), and four other collections of speculative poetry. She is an active member of SFWA, HWA, and SFPA. Find out more from her LiveJournal, Yaddith Times ( ankh-hpl.livejournal.com ) or at home.earthlink.net/~schwader/ .
She says:

I’m a child of the Apollo era. Although Wikipedia informed me that the shuttle was not named for Plato’s lost continent, the link was too apt to ignore. I had the first line or two at least a month early, but watched the launch on July 8th with tears in my eyes. The rest of the poem showed up a few days later.
 

Apollo 11 Eagle illustration is provided by NASA and is in the public domain.



One Response to “11:3: “Launching Atlantis”, by Ann K. Schwader”

Diane says:
September 2, 2012 at 6:56 am
Beautiful! It launched on my birthday!