Procession of stars

.A little bit of our flag, every night,

in the winter sky: Antares (center - and 600 light-years away)

.

If you, when children, could choose your nationality based only on national flags, probably would choose Brazil. Children are attuned to nature, to dogs and ants. For the sky, then, are quite wise - while we, adults, look at the heaven vault to check if it will rain, children ask themselves why that enormity of stars, and if the Moon and the Sun are close to us, believing that it is even possible to get there by helicopter. When we discover that the Sun, so large upstairs, is 150 million quilômeters away, we discover but we don't understand. And when we learn that many of those tiny points in the night sky are quite larger than our Sun, so contemplation goes beyond Delta Orion. Stars begin to captivate the mind, and we begin to suspect that our existence (the entire planet, mankind, the six billons and two hundred millions) is frivolous.

One issue that quickly arise, for children, is if stars have, indeed, pentagonal (or hexagonal) shape. Everywhere we look, here on Earth, they are, sharp. Is in this moment that we understand that they are not only distant, but are spherical, like Earth. The allure increases - it's one of the first times in life, that we're sure we're facing something that goes beyond our knowledge.

***

The Brazilian flag, in this sense, is odd. It's the only national flag, in the entire World, whose design is seen at night in the sky. A pretty sky map, that extrapolates the image of the Southern Cross, that shines in the midst of other 22 stars, from the constellations of Greater Dog, Hydra, Lesser Dog, Octant, Scorpio and Virgin. The white banner (with the positivist slogan "Order and Progress") would be the eliptical, as if marking the passage of Sun and Moon, during the day. The stars would represent Rio de Janeiro's sky, at 8h30m am of november 15th, 1889, when our young Republic was proclaimed - it is 121 years old. Some of those stars are billions years old.

***

When we discover that those constellations are visible in the night sky about six months a year, allure increases - specially when we see the Scorpio, easily identifiable around 10pm, in the winter night sky. In adittion to the Southern Cross, closed to the horizon, lurking, the procession of stars.

The World Cup is coming - South Africa is right there, more and more - begins to spread, day after day, this image of sky, in the night azure. The South-African stadiums (and streets and houses, here) will be subdued by this sky map of the Southern Hemisphere, with a simple sky blue, adorned with earth elements, from forests and gems.

Five stars in the t-shirt aside (perhaps six after july) - precious, yea, is the sky.
.