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W H Auden - Moon Landing
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     It`s natural the Boys should whoop it up for
     so huge a phallic triumph, an adventure
        it would not have occurred to women
        to think worth while, made possible only

     because we like huddling in gangs and knowing
     the exact time: yes, our sex may in fairness
        hurrah the deed, although the motives
        that primed it were somewhat less than menschlich.

     A grand gesture. But what does it period?
     What does it osse? We were always adroiter
        with objects than lives, and more facile
        at courage than kindness: from the moment

     the first flint was flaked this landing was merely
     a matter of time. But our selves, like Adam`s,
        still don`t fit us exactly, modern
        only in this---our lack of decorum.

     Homer`s heroes were certainly no braver
     than our Trio, but more fortunate: Hector
        was excused the insult of having
        his valor covered by television.

     Worth going to see? I can well believe it.
     Worth seeing? Mneh! I once rode through a desert
        and was not charmed: give me a watered
        lively garden, remote from blatherers

     about the New, the von Brauns and their ilk, where
     on August mornings I can count the morning
        glories where to die has a meaning,
        and no engine can shift my perspective.

     Unsmudged, thank God, my Moon still queens the Heavens
     as She ebbs and fulls, a Presence to glop at,
        Her Old Man, made of grit not protein,
        still visits my Austrian several

     with His old detachment, and the old warnings
     still have power to scare me: Hybris comes to
        an ugly finish, Irreverence
        is a greater oaf than Superstition.

     Our apparatniks will continue making
     the usual squalid mess called History:
        all we can pray for is that artists,
        chefs and saints may still appear to blithe it.
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