| |
| THE MOON is up, the stars shine bright, | |
| The milky way glows soft and white. | |
| We’ve spread our sails to catch the breeze | |
| That frets the vast rabbinic seas. | |
| |
| We’ve spread our sails to roam amain | 5 |
| That profits neither gold nor gain, | |
| Whose shores are stretched along a land, | |
| Unmapped by man’s designing hand. | |
| |
| Beneath no lowering, storm-mad skies | |
| We start on our strange enterprise— | 10 |
| Set outward bound, where signals gleam | |
| Beyond the shadows of our dream, | |
| |
| To realms no feet of mortal man | |
| Have trodden on or ever can, | |
| And port at quays no ship-bound crew | 15 |
| Has sighted in the cosmic blue. | |
| |
| The ports there made are set afar | |
| Like distant morn or evening star, | |
| And golden as the halls of Ind | |
| Where hush the sobbings of the wind. | 20 |
| |
| Who rides this main, he travels wide | |
| And sees the flood and ebbing tide | |
| Run up and down a fabled shore | |
| Outlined complete in cryptic lore. | |
| |
| Our rigging firm, our compass true | 25 |
| And manned with brave and seasoned crew | |
| We sail at ease this unplumbed sea | |
| Of knowledge and of mystery. | |
| |
| Enroute we pass odd crafts and barks | |
| Whose pennants fly the signal marks | 30 |
| Of playful whims that, fancy free, | |
| Glide o’er this vast rabbinic sea. | |
| |
| Then undulating like to grain | |
| We rock, as out we head again | |
| Our graceful sloop—or east or west— | 35 |
| It matters not which way the quest. | |
| |
| There flows in this rabbinic sea | |
| The streams whose springs are poetry; | |
| And rivulets from fancy’s height | |
| Drop down to add their welcome mite. | 40 |
| |
| And islands, where the palm trees dim | |
| The visions of the Anakim; | |
| And animals as high as these | |
| Play quoits with fishes in the seas. | |
| |
| Along this course there’s ever found | 45 |
| Elijah on his daily round, | |
| Who unafraid of good or ill, | |
| Strives but to do another’s will. | |
| |
| What pageantry of kings we pass | |
| Resplendent as the royal glass | 50 |
| The sages quaff, when at their feast, | |
| The banquet hall lights up the east. | |
| |
| And all the winds that make the round | |
| Of heaven bring their freighted sound | |
| From halls where grey-haired sages sit | 55 |
| And questions of their Torah knit. | |
| |
| Yet mists at times befog the way | |
| Where fretful white caps madly play; | |
| Then midst the storm the seraphim | |
| Becalm the waves by praising Him. | 60 |
| |
| No other sea full-ebbed as this, | |
| Bequeathed its sailors so much bliss, | |
| For old as are its thundering shores, | |
| Were ne’er bestrewn with spoils of wars. | |
| |
| No craft that ever dents their waves | 65 |
| Discharged its freight in watery graves; | |
| For he who sails this unique sea | |
| Returns with his own argosy. | |
| |
| The moon is up. The stars shine bright; | |
| This mystic sea is swathed in light, | 70 |
| And from its depths droll voices lure | |
| The land beset forth on a tour. | |
| |
| Far from the teeming ports and quays, | |
| Where men and women fret their days, | |
| No cruise as this makes sport of time, | 75 |
| Or breed or border, land or clime. | |
| |
| And in its wake a thousand ships | |
| In gathering darkness evening dips, | |
| Yet happy is each crew, and free, | |
| That sails this vast rabbinic sea. | 80 |
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