Prometheus
by Mercy Turle
After “Cosmic Sunrise” by Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov
Ice dancer drunk
on borrowed gravity,
first of us to fathom
the smallness of it all
firsthand — smuggler
of colored pencils into the
snuggest shuttle ever
sent, before or since,
to the sky — through
thrice-gloved hands &
space sickness & sweat
& sweat & sweat, swore
he needed nothing but
to share the fire with us.
+ You can view a photo of “Cosmic Sunrise” and Leonov’s original pencils from the Museum at the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center, Star City, Moscow Oblast; at The Guardian.