KINSHIP

By: Angela Morgan
October 11, 2026

A series dedicated to poems, published c. 1900–1935, the Radium Age sf-adjacent themes of which include: dystopia and utopia, far-out mathematics and the fourth dimension, Afro-futurism, catastrophe, future war, new technologies, scientific breakthrough, dehumanization, cosmic awe, disenchantment and unseen forces, unknowable aliens and singularity. Research and selection by Joshua Glenn; thematic index here.

KINSHIP

I am aware,
As I go commonly sweeping the stair,
Doing my part of the every-day care —
Human and simple my lot and my share —
     I am aware of a marvelous thing:
     Voices that murmur and ethers that ring
     In the far stellar spaces where cherubim
     sing.
I am aware of the passion that pours
Down the channels of fire through Infinity’s
     doors;
     Forces terrific, with melody shod,
     Music that mates with the pulses of God.
I am aware of the glory that runs
From the core of myself to the core of the
     suns.
     Bound to the stars by invisible chains,
     Blaze of eternity now in my veins,
     Seeing the rush of ethereal rains
Here in the midst of the every-day air —
     I am aware.

I am aware,
As I sit quietly here in my chair,
Sewing or reading or braiding my hair —
Human and simple my lot and my share —
     I am aware of the systems that swing
Through the aisles of creation on heavenly
     wing,
     I am aware of a marvelous thing:
Trail of the comets in furious flight,
Thunders of beauty that shatter the night,
     Terrible triumph of pageants that march
     To the trumpets of time through
     Eternity’s arch.
I am aware of the splendor that ties
All the things of the earth with the things of
     the skies,
     Here in my body the heavenly heat,
     Here in my flesh the melodious beat
     Of the planets that circle Divinity’s feet.
As I sit silently here in my chair,
     I am aware.

— from The Hour Has Struck: A War Poem, and Other Poems (1914). I’m not sure if it was published previously.

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RADIUM AGE PROTO-SF POETRY: Stephen Spender’s THE PYLONS | George Sterling’s THE TESTIMONY OF THE SUNS | Archibald MacLeish’s EINSTEIN | Thomas Thornely’s THE ATOM | C.S. Lewis’s DYMER | Stephen Vincent Benét’s METROPOLITAN NIGHTMARE | Robert Frost’s FIRE AND ICE | Aldous Huxley’s FIFTH PHILOSOPHER’S SONG | Sara Teasdale’s “THERE WILL COME SOFT RAINS” | Edith Södergran’s ON FOOT I HAD TO… | Robert Graves’s WELSH INCIDENT | Nancy Cunard’s ZEPPELINS | D.H. Lawrence’s WELLSIAN FUTURES | & many more.