Ultima Thule, or, How to Talk to the Dead

The mythical island of Thule in the Carta marina of Olaus Magnus (1539)

In the most high and palmy state of Rome,

A little ere the mightiest Julius fell,

The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead

Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets.

—Hamlet, act 1, scene 1

Conversing with the dead's an art that's felt.

l wouldn't call it fine! First, ask where they are.

Could it be Heaven? Or in the Kuiper Belt,

with just deserts "gàr'd near Neptune’s car"?

Good guess! But Pluto really doesn't like

them! Cerebral skills piss off or take a hike.

A painful soupçon has to be conceded:

Is Ultima Thule the home from home that's needed?

Soliloquizing spirits squeak and groan.

The interlocutor comes across a stone.

Better to be concurring with a quark

than Arrokoth, rotating in the dark!

How should I put it? Look for a karmic spark.

Curriculum vitae's fading from the bone.

The minor planet Arrokoth, formerly called Ultima Thule.

Note: “Arrokoth” is apparently a Powhatan or Virginia Algonquian word meaning “sky” or “cloud.”