Poetry-Science

Once, In the middle of nowhere There hid a Tiny speck of dust Smaller than The smallest microbe. With all the playful energy The miniscule pinprick contained, It couldn’t wait A single moment longer To meet the world And make new friends. So The tiny speck of dust Exploded, Launching a shower Of vibrant reds, Oranges, And yellows Into the swirl of gloom above. And that was how The universe began. Glamorous stars Blinked at each other In the inky night sky. Bits of cast off rock, Large and small, Sped around the stars Like race cars. More and more rocks joined; The racetrack became too packed And the charging rocks collided Until gradually, Planet Earth Emerged from the chaos. Back then, Our home planet Was a totally different world. Infuriated asteroids and meteorites Crashed into the Simmering surface. But planet Earth Tired of its intense workout, Finally settled down, Falling into rhythm Around the sizzling sun. All of a sudden, A stray ball of rock Came hurling through outer space, A furious untamed lion Ready to devour all in its path. But our newborn planet Fought back, Cracking the foreigner into pieces, Sending a spurt Of dusty stone Into the air. But the fight was not over yet– Some of the stone Was squashed into a ball, Forming our Now dearest companion, The moon. Sights of life Finally appeared on Earth. Molecules linked together, And as more joined, Began to make Replicas of themselves. Membranes formed Around these molecules By fatty by-products. And humans finally made Their first appearance As invisible Single-celled organisms. This, Reader, Is how our dazzling universe, Full of all its stunning wonders, Came to be. Yutia Li, 9Houston, TX

Many things are true, I know this is, too: there is no cold, there is only the absence of heat. Heat is a fluid thing that has no form except for life-saving warmth. Cold only happens when heat is not there. Cold is not a thing. It is a happening that makes the body shiver and shake. Heat relieves that pain, makes you sweat (and sweat can be a nuisance) but it is just heat reassuring you that it will always be there. Kieran O’Donnell, 11Philadelphia, PA