Constellation

Witnessing the same
evidence, we derive the same
conclusions, with uncanny (and unwarranted)
likeness. Quine calls it the scandal
of induction. Shackle the stars in electric chains
of imagination, name an outline
a horse with wings,
or a scorpion’s tail,
and humanity cannot
fail to fill in
the rest.

The lessons we
plagiarize from the night
sky, headlines from the scandal sheet
of record, how sure are we
their tense is not
fixed in the archive,
where here and there are
nothing but the remove
of centuries? How sure are we
that eternity can be measured
by the billions of
lightyears the present is past
or that the future, having happened
yesterday, will arrive
when it was supposed to?