Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Changing the Stars

If the stars can change in seasons and latitudes, then can they change in the observer? Do heavenly bodies appear as seeds and buckets of water to the sinewy farmer standing on his famine-stricken earth or as silvery coins to the bemoaning beggar. This also brings the question: can anybody perceptually alter these entities? Can people besides the poor and desperate make these transformations? If a sun-blistered farmer and a simple vagrant can do it, why couldn't a king?  Can things like stars that are so untouchable, consistent and seemingly eternal be completely mutable? I asked the one question because I don't know how to think like a king and I asked the other because I don't know how so many people are completely unable to manage or change their own lives for a better result but can effortlessly swing around the long-dying gas-giants and spin top-turning quasars of blue and green into the places they want them to be. 

The stars are personal but universal, like finger prints. Permanent, but alterable, like the human soul. When the ancients looked at the stars they saw gods and dragons and heroes, today we still see some of the same myths and stories that the ancients ascribed to the stars, but we give them names like  Dec 7° 24.426' instead of names like Betelgeuse. You can use the declination coordinates to find that star somewhat easily or you can just look for the hand of Orion, either way you'll be led to the same red giant. But you don't have to see the hand of a Zeus-ordained hunter or an alpha-numeric code, it can be whatever you see upon first sight.

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