A responsibility to Awe. A poem by Rebecca Elson, astronomer.

We astronomers

We astronomers are nomads,

Merchants, circus people,

All the earth our tent.

We are industrious.

We breed enthusiasms,

Honour our responsibility to awe.

But the universe has moved a long way off.

Sometimes, I confess,

Starlight seems too sharp.

And like the moon,

I bend my face to the ground,

To the small patch where each foot falls,

Before it falls,

And I forget to ask questions,

And only count things.

©2001 Rebecca Elson

From the bundle "A responsibility to Awe". Rebecca was an astronomer; her work took her to the boundary of the visible and measurable. "Facts are only as interesting as the possibilities they open up to the imagination," she wrote. Rebecca is no longer with us, but her poetry lives on.

Poem a responsibility to awe

©2026 Rob Millenaar