When Galileo Knelt Before

When Galileo Knelt Before

When Galileo knelt before

The Inquisition to recant

The views that he was censored for

The Church was eager to supplant,

And rather than burn at the stake

The man had to recant instead

And said that he made a mistake,

Unsaying what it was he said.

(Because Earth went around about

The Sun, and not the other way,

What he had said threw into doubt

Whatever the Church had to say

Since Ptolemy declared it so

That Aristotle, himself, said

What everybody ought to know—

It goes around the Earth instead) 

So Galileo would concede

His being wrong, their being right,

Admitting he would have to plead

That this had been his oversight.

The Vatican’s Academy

Had jurisdiction over him;

The Cardinals’ inquiry

Had consequences that were grim,

So as he knelt before the crowd

Of Cardinals assembled there

His head submissively was bowed

Before the Penitential Prayer;

Facing the choice of Life or Death

He had to state it loud and clear:

It stays! (but said under his breath)

But moves! so as nobody’d hear.