A D V E N T U R E S in C Y B E R S O U N D
Desert Sonnet, Number 12
by John Pockley, c. 1960
One perfect, windless, starlit, moonless night,
a mopoke iterating far below,
high on a ridge, exposed, as though in flight,
the fire diminished to a warmer glow,
I turned a magic modern knob. And then
heard Gielgud reading Eliot's Four Quartets.
Maybe some time the chants of stone age men
recalling dream-time tales no tribe forgets.
reiterated like the mopokes song
along this crest beneath the moving stars.
This voice, this author, clearly both belong
to peaks of man's achievment. Nothing mars
perfection. It ends: and nature holds its breath
This night will comfort me until my death.
Source: John Pockley's son, Simon: simonp@cinemedia.net
Published as part of Simon's PhD, The Flight of Ducks
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