DNA and Carbon in Asteroids (oh my), bonus poem from the “Periodic Table of Poetry” series by Chicago poet Janet Kuypers

DNA and Carbon, in Asteroids (oh my)

Janet Kuypers

bonus poem from the “Periodic Table of Poetry” series
3/13/13

You know, us Carbon-based life forms
always wonder where we came from,
how we got here.

And with science on our side,
we’ve looked beyond
guessing and story telling
to find proof in our answers.

And still, we look beyond
what we know around us
to find out how we were formed
here on earth.

#

A couple of asteroids
just flew
perilously close to the earth.
Asteroid 2012 DA 14 intersected the iridium constellation,
flew through all of our global communication satellites.
An asteroid turned meteor blew up in the atmosphere
above the Ural mountains;
every Russian on the road
filmed the sky explosion
with their dashboard cameras,
before the sonic boom shattered windows everywhere
and injured over a thousand people.

And over two thirds of our planet
is covered in water,
just think of all of the impacts
we’re missing out on;
I mean, our news feeds
don’t come from the middle of the ocean…

So we seem to think that these stellar explosions
are becoming more and more rare,
because our planet is pocked with massive impacts
from the earth’s early history.
But now that these scientists
have been scanning the skies
and studying the meteors buried in Antarctica,
they’ve learned that many asteroids and meteors
colliding with our planet’s crust
actually carry atanine and guanine.

Asteroids carry major structures that form DNA.

It’s very possible
that throughout the early history of earth,
asteroids collided with this planet,
leaving their Carbon-rich DNA structures behind
to help start life, and populate the earth.

I mean, Scientists have always wondered
how the elemental sextet of life:
Carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, phosphorous, nitrogen, calcium,
how did these elements got together
in just the right way
to eventually create earth’s Carbon-based life forms.

I guess it would help that primordial soup
if some asteroids brought along
a little bit of DNA,
so some of our building blocks
came ready-made.

Astronomers say that we’re all made out of stardust,
because all of our atoms
originate from the explosion of stars,
but for this Carbon-based life form,
it’s cool that some of these asteroids and meteors
carried our Carbon —
and some of our DNA —
here to planet earth,
to jump-start our creation
and get our genetic gears going.

Ibiza.Video Poem Music.Robin Marchesi

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQkxMszvnyc

***
Nomad trucker it’s the end
When your driving straight
Not round the bend
Cos the road goes ever, ever on
Slip sliding through this simple song
And the ways of man that I’ll never know
They cry in my heart to feed the soul….

And I don’t want to go
To Ibiza again
You can keep your Manumission
Bambuddha and his friend
Your Santa Eulalia wisdom
Why it’s left me high and dry
On an ocean of emotion
That sweeps across the sky….

Cos the road goes ever, ever on
Slip sliding through this simple song
And the ways of man that I’ll never know
They cry in my heart to feed the soul….

Nomad trucker it’s the end
When your driving straight
Not round the bend
Cos the road goes ever, ever on
Slip sliding through this simple song
And the ways of man that I’ll never know
They cry in my heart to feed the soul….

***
Robin Marchesi, born in 1951, began writing in his teens, much to the consternation of his mother, the sister of Eric Hobsbawm, the historian.

In 1992 Cosmic Books published his first book entitled “A B C Quest”.

In 1996 March Hare Press published “Kyoto Garden” and in 1999 “My Heart is As…”

ClockTowerBooks published his Poetic Novella, “A Small Journal of Heroin Addiction”, digitally, in 2000.

Charta Books published his latest work entitled “Poet of the Building Site”, about his time working with Barry Flanagan the Sculptor of Hares, in association with the Irish Museum of Modern Art.

He is presently working on an upcoming novel entitled “A Story Made of Stone.”


***

http://www.illywords.com/2011/09/down-the-rabbit-hole-a-glimpse-into-the-wonderland-of-barry-flanagan/
***
http://robinmarchesi.com

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The Good Old Days Poem by Joan Pond

shallow_thoughts

The Good Old Days Expired
by Joan Pond

The good old days expired
when I sat on the bed
and he said he didn”t love me
as much as I loved him.
Irrecoverable
obsolete,
I was past perfect;
incomplete without him
Once upon a time
I”d found my prince
but he turned me into something
less.
Weighed
and found wanting
I packed beggardly boxes
and left,
not wanting to lose more
than I could
afford.

***
shallow_thoughts
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Cesium, “Periodic Table of Poetry” poem by Chicago poet Janet Kuypers

Cesium

Janet Kuypers

from the “Periodic Table of Poetry” series (#055, Cs)

Is this the best of times?
Is this the worst of times?
Or is this just
             one of those times?

Only humans understand time —
where did all the time go?
Do we even know?
Time slips away
as we look for ways
to keep time every day
right down to the nanosecond.

Because without my Cesium,
I couldn’t be so obsessed
with being on time
for absolutely everything…

Without Cesium clocks,
everyone would be forced
to be their clueless selves
when it comes to their time
in this global village…

We can thank Cesium-133
for producing identical radiation
at exactly the same frequency,
which makes Cesium perfect
for the Cesium atomic clock
that monitors time globally
in such perfect detail.

Perfect for my obsession with time.

But I have to remember
that with Cesium or without,
time is only a human construct…
I’ll need to check my watch,
and remind myself of this
at times like these.