Before Galileo's telescope:

It is a famous moment, the scientist

peers through a tube, a journey in action

not soul, turned the planet, sent it spinning

forever around the sun, proof the stars

held us in tandem, now in thrall

to facts and corrections.

Before the before,

the descent was a feminine thing

then men defined their place,

decided to build the burial kilns

and fire themselves into godhood.

Once we had the pregnant cave,

the beast and the hero:

the descent into understanding

through the journey.

The answer was not the solution,

it was an image

held up as possible illumination;

a means to become

rather than to be.

I wonder not I think.