We found your Golden Record voyaging in ’97—

The year 4,510,001,997 to be precise—

an archeologist’s El Dorado.

Rather vague were the inscriptions on the surface,

but we learned about The Rosetta Stone

66 billion miles earlier

and mastered the art of Banburismus

before you constructed white-roofed revival dens.

 

Roving reverberations report

the latest intelligence from Earth,

but no episodes are as salacious as

“Tame Dog” or “Herding Sheep, Blacksmith, Sawing.”

Played at 16-2/3 revolutions per minute,

babies count sheep to 55 Greetings and

gurgle Punjabi and Swedish in their night hallucinations.

 

Our decipherers specialize in English,

and sometimes lurk in Latin,

but wonder if our friends across the saucer  

ever learned Glóssa.

One wheel transmits outdated flashes

in 480 to 750 THz and

every rerun has us in fits during the holidays:

glyphs that only go up to 0!

Helixes for bones!

The ol’ wheel and horn!

Blackened skies and toxic seas!

 

Spacecraft chronicles report that

our Mellontium Record has been sailing

backwards in the Stygian

since ’#1.

Dark Was the Night, and Cold Was the Ground

strummed into static that day,

and we wait

to see

if anybody else is left. 

​

Your cipher: https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/golden-record