Poem by Dominique Dobransky
Film by Elena Ciotta
Music: Victoria Pitz
Issue No. 19 • Spring 2018
Our paths are drawn out in cartographic lines,
Blueprints of motion navigating atmospheric traffic signs.
In the heavens there are invisible compasses many don’t even know:
Flowing, crisscrossing colors that match our footfalls with an ever-shifting glow.
North, south, east, west -
Mapping our personal journeys on an everyday quest.
Yet spinning on its axis our Earth pulses with galaxies of travel,
Unspoken narratives of migration - can they stop the downward gazes at our own feet on the gravel?
Artists, dreamers - tell these stories and lift your gazes high;
We all dream under the same sky
As the darkness of nightfall quiets the rush of humanity’s daily roam,
Flickers in the Milky Way reveal stars that persevere in a flight pattern to find home.
Light chasing refugees forced to rewrite their location in the solar system that we all share,
Narrowly trying to evade black holes of legalistic ignorance that destroy this map without a care.
There is a constellation of stories that must be given a voice,
Each person a light in this celestial dreamscape; deserving a dream, a chance, a choice.
Artists, can you present new telescopes of perspective to those who do not yet see -
That these shooting stars belong to the astronomical space we all wish upon, the collective “we”?
Artists, dreamers - tell these stories and lift your gazes high;
We all dream under the same sky
We paint by-number the places these migrating stars have journeyed to seek
We dance choreographies of light, illuminating realities some have not yet dared to speak
We compose melodies of hope in the atmosphere which we have heard
We document cinematic supernovas, freeing those caged by laws like a bird
We dream
We create
We dream
We advocate
We dream
We communicate
We dream
For those who only see the dusk, the end of day, the darkness of night,
Let us collectively create awareness to renew its light.
The universe is vast - “hereness” and “thereness” converge and all have a place,
In this cartography of luminescence that has been mapped in outer space.
Stars, you dreamers, here’s to you I say -
Remember that your constellations deserve to stay.
Glow on. Lighter. Brighter. Illuminating the world to your cry.
We all dream under the same sky.