(no subject)

[tree_and_leaf]

In other news, I am feeling terribly bleary, as everyone in the flat has spontaneously developed a Cough of Doom, which meant a night of coughing echoing through the remarkably thin walls, and not much sleep. Oh well, it would have been a good deal less sleep had yesterday's news been different.

Now I must finish various bits of writing, before heading off to Evensong and then Cub Pack of Chaos, before the theology course.

Tomorrow, happily is my day off, and an expedition to Rochester (fast trains and a cathedral!†) is mooted.


Also, I have found a poem, by Robert A Heinlein (which I gather is probably well known by people who know more about previous generations of SF than I do), which seems to me to be heavily chaneling Kipling:

The Green Hills of Earth

Let the sweet fresh breezes heal me
As they rove around the girth
Of our lovely mother planet
Of the cool, green hills of Earth.

We rot in the moulds of Venus,
We retch at her tainted breath.
Foul are her flooded jungles,
Crawling with unclean death.

[ --- the harsh bright soil of Luna ---
--- Saturn's rainbow rings ---
--- the frozen night of Titan --- ]

We've tried each spinning space mote
And reckoned its true worth:
Take us back again to the homes of men
On the cool, green hills of Earth.

The arching sky is calling
Spacemen back to their trade.
ALL HANDS! STAND BY! FREE FALLING!
And the lights below us fade.

Out ride the sons of Terra,
Far drives the thundering jet,
Up leaps a race of Earthmen,
Out, far, and onward yet ---

We pray for one last landing
On the globe that gave us birth;
Let us rest our eyes on fleecy skies
And the cool, green hills of Earth.



† Stereotypical Anglican clerical - or embryonic clerical - interests are stereotypical.