Chemical Elements Poems 5: Nirvana at Sixes and Sevens

Big Bang created, destroyed in starry hearts,
as salts, in batteries, some reach for you
to conquer the poles
while we listen for nirvana at sixes and sevens.

Big Bang created, destroyed in fusion bombs,
your crimson flame is not easily extinguished
though the biologists say we can live without you.

Chemical Elements Poems 4: Metal and Metaphor

It was called little silver and white gold
and the only metal fit for a king
or a queen mother.
It was the only metal fit for SI,
measuring meters and masses.

In a pile of rock the weight of the Titanic
you may expect an ounce of platinum.

You may think it more metaphor than metal:
shades of blonde and best-sellers,
and high-limit credit cards,
but most of it ends up in junkyards
inside rusting-out beaters.

Chemical Elements Poems 3: Morning Star Echoes

Black and red, violet and white,

morning star echoes bone and apatite.

Willie Peter traces with urine's remains,

Arsenic replaces but community complains

Smoke bombs and toothpaste, lucifer in match head

Black and white, violet and red.

Chemical Elements Poems 2: Noble Most Common

Noble most common,
cheap as the air
and found dating rocks.

Though lazily
willing to mix with
the reactive crowd
it will still protect the Constitution.

Perhaps she remembers
earthier beginnings
birthed from plant ash
and feldspar.

----

Perhaps I should make readers guess the relevant elements? :)

Chemical Elements Poems 1: hydrogen or nothing

let me begin at the beginning.

it was once hydrogen or nothing,

and it is still pretty much hydrogen 

or nothing.

simple but no bohr, 

this one is not lonely

water-former giving light

sun to enewetak

balmy atoll become balmer.

National Poetry Writing Month 2011

Last year I took part in National Poetry Writing Month right here on this blog, writing 30 poems about baseball (one for each team).  It's come up again (as it does every April) and after some waffling I've decided to do it again.  This year's theme is apparently going to be The Periodic Table of the Elements, much to my surprise.  So, the idea is to do one poem per day.  Given travel and other stuff we'll see how it goes.  But be warned-- for the next month there's not likely to be much bad music, instead it'll be bad poetry. :)

LPSC Blues

OK, here's the other song I played at the Goose's Acre party that people asked me to post:  LPSC Blues.

This one has a bit of a long history. Jury Rig used to play it straight (as Summertime Blues with the arrangement by The Who), then we adapted it to be the LPL Blues, which Science Diet inherited.  When Science Diet started playing at LPSC we changed around some of the words again and all took a verse.  We never could get Joe Spitale to sing his verse, but that's another story.  I wasn't originally intending to sing this one at the party but a day or two before playing I decided it'd be a crowd pleaser (plus I came up with the second verse and realized I had to do it).

I just kind of slapped this down quickly tonight, a couple of guitars (and my hands were killing me with the barre chords-- I'm out of practice).  The effect on the punchlines is true-ish to The Who and the original Eddie Cochran, though not so much for the way we played it, exactly.

You're probably here for the words, so here goes:
-----
I'm gonna raise a fuss, I'm gonna raise a holler
I've been working the whole fiscal year to try to earn a dollar
I wrote off to NASA to try and get a grant, they said
"We'd like to help you son, but Congress says we can't."
I don't know what I'm gonna do but there ain't no cure for the LPSC Blues

I've been working on a mission and I'd love to see it flying
We've been studying it for twenty years, I'm kind of sick of trying
Went to the Decadal Survey to try to get it famous they said
"I guess it's kind of interesting, but we'd rather probe Uranus."
I don't know what I'm gonna do but there ain't no cure for the LPSC Blues

As long as I'm in Houston I must make a confession
I'm supposed to give my talk tomorrow in the morning session
Went to my coauthors, here's what they said to me:
"Go ahead and blow it off, it's just LPSC."
I don't know what I'm gonna do but there ain't no cure for the LPSC Blues