Another Geeky Parody: "I Get The Grants"

I seem to be on a bit of a parody/re-write roll on the blog of late with the posting of the LPSC Blues and We Didn't Start The Science.  So maybe I shouldn't be surprised that this post is in the same vein, but I'm surprised anyway.  Those of you who aren't scientists (or grant writers) might find this even less enjoyable than usual:  "I Get The Grants"

The idea for this song has been percolating for a little while, maybe a year or so.  I don't exactly remember but I think someone made a comment about writing computer code and we were joking about "I write the code that makes the users cry" and that it'd be a fine idea for a song.  This is not that song, though. Aspiring songwriters--that idea is still out there!   Instead I went to a subject I know too well, that of writing proposals to NASA.  With various deadlines about our ears, I dedicate it to all those PIs, Co-Is, Collaborators, and reviewers out there. 

End of NaPoWriMo!

With May comes the end of National Poetry Writing Month.  So it's probably back to sporadically-posted music here.  I don't know that any of the poetry was better than what the Vogons write, but at least I had some fun. :) 

Maybe constellations next year? 

Chemical Elements Poems 30: Quintessence

In ancient times it was taught
There was air and water, fire and earth
Some thought there was a fifth
 to make it all complete.

Democritus and Galilei
Mendeleev and Lavoisier
Said all was atoms
Nothing more or less.
Ether proved ethereal.

Now learned astronomers
track the motions of the stars
and find there must be
more under the sun. 

One hundred eighteen elements
are known to us
and yet
five-sixths of the universe
must be made of
something else.

Chemical Elements Poems 29: If We Grant That Love Is Like Oxygen

If we grant
that love is like oxygen,
does that mean
lust is like ozone:
perhaps related
to love
but not something
your body can use
to live on?

Or perhaps lust
is like carbon monoxide,
binding to the blood
and fooling it
into thinking
it's getting oxygen?

And what, then, is water?
Too much won't get you high
but it will cause
bloating and  discomfort.

Perhaps the lesson
is that chemical compounds
are not easily mapped
onto feelings and sensations
after all.

Chemical Elements Poems 28: Object of Alchemists' Desire

Object of alchemists' desire,
metal of medals,
of fleece and fleecing.

As a rule it does
like no other,
leaving aside
calves or laying geese.

All that has been
dug from the Earth
in thousands of years
would fit in a few
swimming pools.
If all sold it could buy up
all of Manhattan
and all of Florida
a couple of times over.

However,
Midas would tell you
other things glitter
more brightly. 

Chemical Elements Poems 27: Alpha Noble

colorless
odorless
tasteless
inert
monatomic.

made in the Big Bang
fused in the Sun
ejected from
radioactive nuclei

one-quarter of normal matter,
abundant through
the universe.
we fill balloons
and let them soar
to meet their alpha siblings.

Chemical Elements Poems 26: Village Quarry, Baltic Isle

Village quarry,

Baltic isle.

In the form of a black rock,

fate visits.

Mother lode in

discarded slag;

another's treasure.

Chemists delight

in discovery's glow, 

punctuating

before the period.

Four elements named

for the village, 

another three

with roots in the 

same ground.

Rare earth, indeed.