When they come back from the stars, we will not know them.
Dark seas have washed their faces clean of love
Or loss or fear, past earthly comprehension.
Their bones are coldsleep coral now, eroded
By slowly dreaming centuries, & light
From dying stars our skies have long forgotten
Still lingers in the black pearls of their eyes.
When they come back from the stars, we will not know them.
Their tongues have twisted comets out of thought
& forged new orbits for the myths we made
By fading firelight in the caves of winter.
Sun-winds send siren gusts like tides beneath
Their words, between their syncopated hearts
Forgetting—then remembering—to beat.
When they come back from the stars, they will not know us
Except as footprints on some night-drowned beach
They walked as children, pining even then
For oceans gravity did not command
Nor pitted satellites predict. Our voices
Cry little more than silence to their senses
Distanced forever by something rich & strange.