Science-Art

Jupiter
Sitting there
Protector
Shielding us from rocky storms
Or
Sinister betrayer
Sling-shoting armageddon
Towards us
A Projectile wraith
For your rocky brethren
Nestled near the sun
What will the maths show Which way will the simulation swing
Gaseous Giants – Benevolent gods
Or Destroyers of Worlds
Wrapped in jealousy
That their own embryonic systems
Lay aborted, half formed in decaying rings

Bang from null
Gravity pull
Matters crushed
Planet from dust
Rock cools
Liquid drools
Primordial soup
Bacterial troop
Single cell
Creature swell
Populate seas
Soil now greens
Fish lose gills
Crawl to hills
Lizards grow hair
Fly to the air
Dinosaurs rule
Mammals no fool
Heat changes rules
Animals rule
Four feet
Two feet
Knuckles on ground
Standing sound
Grunts to teach
Divided by speech
Kill for brood
Tame our food
Clear a path
Forest in ash
Tribal migration
Civilization
Tools of bone
Homes in stone
Bronze cuts
Iron guts
Fight in arms
Atomic alarm
Steel machines
Electric dreams
Carbon fibres
Composite binds
Think it
Print it
Rape earth
Mineral worth
Pockets lined
Species decline
Sins atoned
DNA cloned
Sentient virus
Progress forges
Machines slink
Codes think
Smug omnipotence
Create in own image
Body now limits
Energy spirits
Voided reality
Eternal banality
Break the lull
Bang from null

By Jason Conway

I reached a new hemisphere
I have a feeling that you did with me too
Climbing my stairs to the stars

I want to be the kind of cliche I hate
Touching, killing cynicism
I want to look to the moon hand in hand
And try to compare it’s beauty to you
But fail
Beats in my chest skip and I feel
Breathless
I’m not sure if it’s the romcom way or
They type that’s the ending to Apollo 13

But it’s clear
We’re making like Bowie
Trying to find life on Mars

Abort Mission

By Polly Gannaway

The Dead Galaxy

Hung in the Vacuum

A dark remnant

Of a glittering time

A ghostly structure

Where the cogs seized

Where the fire died

Where there was an

end to annihilation

And the star birth

The cycle broken

the whisper of creation

Silenced

It drifted

Dense in blackness

With the Eater of Light

Still beating at its core

The only thing that

breathed motion

a deathly life

An eater of worlds

Super massive galactic

Cannibal forever

Hungry

It is the After Life

And the Gate to Hell

For the Stellar Host

That once shone so brightly

The moon is dangling from the ceiling of the night.
My grandson, eighteen months of age, totters
Along our quiet close in hot pursuit of it.

Frequent stumbles don’t discourage him. His grandma
Has him wrapped up like a mini-Michelin-man.
I follow closely, ears alert for traffic movement.

This shiny thing, he’s sure, is almost within reach.
Jumping’s an art he has mastered yet.
His outstretched, chubby fingers grasp in vain.

“Up, up, up,“ he babbles, clutching at my knee.
I hoist him skywards, one arm round my neck,
The other grabbing for what’s unattainable.

I tote him home the fifty yards or so
To warmth of bathroom, change to jim-jams
And the current bedtime story “IT WAS JAKE.”

No other book will do. It’s asked for every time.
Alternatives are vigorously waved aside.
We chant familiar sentences. His eyelids droop.

Tomorrow, with its fields of opportunity,
Will have his full attention when he wakes.
Meantime, my grandson’s dreaming only of the moon

And Jake!

By Peter Wyton

The mystical white hare appears on the hill,
ghost like, just before midnight.
Ever watchful, silent and still,
under shimmering stars so bright.

A creature so rare, a spectral sight,
Unknown omen of good or bad tidings.
So beware when the moon is luminous white
and you hear the church bells chiming.

Cursed or blessed you will never know,
to see this rare creature so white.
So beware when walking on the hill,
alone, just before midnight.

Carol Sheppard

Mysterious moonlings, what are they?
High-voiced, small statured;
The lingering other.
Moved like the tides.
Awakened wild-eyed by the full moon moonlight.
Sometimes they are crazy. Sometimes they nod
In a wisdom known only between themselves
And the white orb that guides them.
They know the moon as we do not know the moon.
Men dream:
Feet upon a rocky surface,
Dust between the fingertips,
Low-gravity buoyancy.
They drift. Wane and wax. Full to new.
Round as a mother. Refreshed and renewed.
They place their fingertips on their stomachs and their eyes to the skies
Waiting for another moon.

By Rowena Fletcher-Wood

I love you Moon. You overpower me,

pushing and pulling the Red Sea in my veins.

You silently observe me while I sleep

piercing my body with your mystic rays.

Do you love me Moon? Show me your hidden side!

Like Mona Lisa’s knowing lips you goad

me past all natural bounds, inflamed to find

the face you don’t want anyone to know.

Love for you, Moon, is an ever-present pain.

You’re close to me always, but forever beyond hope.

I fear I’ll never stroke your dusky plains

or plant a kiss upon your dimpled slopes.

But still I freely offer you my mind

to use according to your own design.

By Colin Waterman

Do You Remember?

Do you remember when we were young?
How sugar plums shone in the sun
How the moon rose in the sky
Like a giant cheese way up high
How the clouds sailed scudding by
Till it felt as though we and the trees
Moved under the windswept sky.

Do you remember?

Do you remember the dreams we had?
Of dragons lurking in the dark
And fairy dust sprinkled over grass
sparkling in morning light as feet passed
Across the fields of waving grain
Days that lasted full of sunshine
And how it never seemed to rain?

Do you remember?

Josephine Lay 2018

You’re a quarter million miles away
A blue and white swirling globe
A beacon lighting the blackness of space
The Earth is a sight to behold.
Awaiting my Soyuz taxi
I’m being picked up very soon
I’ve studied the landscape in my LRV
Of the dark side of the moon.
I spot a small bright speck in the heavens
That will guarantee my egress.
Excitement quickens my breathing
It is the Soyuz come from the ISS.
When they land I have some astounding news
A discovery beyond belief
For days I’ve kept it all to myself
To tell others would be a relief.
The lunar rover’s batteries were dead
Which I was replacing with the last spare
Sat in a crater, nose pointing down
A spacecraft had crashed over there.
It wasn’t man-made I’m sure of that
It came from some other star
Smooth and metallic – no windows or doors
Shaped like a cuban cigar.
I’m considering telling the Soyuz crew
Or wait till I get home?
Whatever I say, there’s no getting away
From the news that we’re now not alone.
It would devastate the whole of mankind
Greatly alter the status quo
So I’m going to forget that I ever saw it
And the World will never know.

By Marion Feasey