Upon the sapphire is the light a star?
Who is to say it is not compass points,
Or non-Euclidean geometry
Upon the rounded blue? As sign a star,
The shining asterisk is star but less;
Is radiance without the consequence—
Astrology without prediction: twelve
In one, one fate and one mortality.
If you would have your charting different,
Examine then star rubies. Theirs is truth
Extrapolated from the blood, the flash
Of heat across the chill of mineral.
The East and West and North and South of love;
Its novel proofs, its parallels that meet.
Turner Cassity

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This article originally appeared in The New Criterion, Volume 25 Number 3, on page 29
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