The Poetry of Science
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Hi, my name is Sam Illingworth, and I am a Senior Lecturer in Science Communication at Manchester Metropolitan University. My research involves looking at the ways in which different media can be used to connect science and the rest of society, and one of those ways is through poetry. Every week I find a new piece of scientific research, read the journal article that describes it and then..
The Poetry of Science
1w ago
Water runs clear,
a seeming serenity
caught in the half-light
of tasteless threats
and silent screams.
It lingers,
patient as a poacher’s line
to seep
from treatment’s cracks
unfiltered,
unsealed,
untamed.
A toxic residue
that chokes the flow,
spoiling souls
before their blooming –
distortions
of the heart’s first labour.
Heed the far bankside
where these drowsed serpents
coil among the reeds
their fangs brine the springs,
their venom our end.
This poem is inspired by recent research, which has found that common water pollutants cause heart damage in fish.
Imagine turning on your tap and exp ..read more
The Poetry of Science
2w ago
Riven with cracks,
fissures serpentine
vent gaseous plumes
that reach beyond
the stars –
grains of frozen brine
beneath
that pitiless crust.
Oceans churn
in depths
no light perceives,
where harsh
unearthly cauldrons
spew forth
their frozen code.
Our robots scan
each icy fleck,
whittling truth
from vacant black –
celestial jetsam,
cosmic seed,
bearing strange fruit
for new nativity
across the worlds
that rift
and rede.
An artist’s rendition of Saturn’s moon Enceladus depicts hydrothermal activity on the seafloor and cracks in the moon’s icy crust that allow material from the watery interior to ..read more
The Poetry of Science
3w ago
In the shadows of ancient trees,
towers mute,
immense,
bristling with sap-burnt memories.
Sapphire light
dances
over weathered rings –
hieroglyphs from an age
we burned,
bled,
calved,
and grew.
When molten heavens thundered
and volcanic seas dissolved
mountains ghosted
in cloud-cathedral’s
sacred blue.
Each ring appals
with the memory
of Earth’s contortions
amidst the scattered whispers
of patient boughs –
a clarion call
to soothe the oceans’
ebbing tides.
This poem is inspired by recent research, which has used ancient tree rings to reconstruct the climate records of North China.
Over the l ..read more
The Poetry of Science
1M ago
Down in the obsidian
teeth and sinew flex
against the remorseless flow
of that immense and gelid gloom.
There move leviathans –
archaic dread
made flesh,
hewn from the brine itself
these crawling shadows
drifted
from the drowned world’s womb.
Yet now the sleekest blades
descend on high –
the slash,
the rend,
the price
of new delicacies.
Precious squalene
to be sold and rendered
to our latest craze,
as tidal-ghosts
lay banished,
born now
to emptiness,
ruin,
pain.
This poem is inspired by recent research, which has found that fishing for oil and meat drives deepwater shark and ray decline.
The ..read more
The Poetry of Science
1M ago
In the clawed grasp
of forest’s end
a continent breathes –
exhales the green
inhales the dust,
bare as bone
the earth beneath.
Trees fall
in deafening silence,
as in their shadows
death’s vectors swarm –
blood-sailors
casting off
against the tide.
Some spared,
others bound
by birthright,
by geography,
by wealth.
Here lies the tale
of stolen lands,
of broken deeds
yet to touch
the soil of truth –
where children’s dreams
are fevered,
by fate’s cruel hand,
defined.
This poem is inspired by recent research, which has found that deforestation exacerbates the risk of malaria for the most vulnerabl ..read more
The Poetry of Science
1M ago
Clouds gather
like ancient gods
converging,
conspiring,
shedding
secrets of
the coming floods.
Twilight’s blankets
cluster,
tightening ranks
over belted waves
to seal their pact
in vaulted skies.
This bloated
congregation
now flails with
righteous pain,
carving sodden welts
through fraying skin.
And the earth
drowns in tears
it never thought
to shed.
This poem is inspired by recent research, which has found that cloud clustering causes more extreme rain.
Around the equator, heavy rainfalls can lead to flooding, affecting millions of people and causing significant damage to homes and infrastr ..read more
The Poetry of Science
1M ago
In the river of stars,
waves crash
and burn –
a dance of particles,
unseen,
unfelt,
unknown.
Neutrons,
like murmurs,
collide in the night,
absorbing the call
to shift,
transform,
assume –
a new weight,
not decay
but growth
reversing the flow
to dampen a storm.
From the heart
of a star
to the soul
of a world.
Detections of gravitational waves from merging neutron stars tipped off researchers here on Earth that it should be possible to predict how neutrons interact with atomic nuclei (Image Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/CI Lab).
This poem is inspired by recent research, which has l ..read more
The Poetry of Science
2M ago
Material drifts as dream,
grand paths etched
into the void
charting distance,
hunger,
light.
Twin hearts
beat as one,
burning dead
and bright
across the stage
of time.
One pulse surges,
its partner
prey,
stripped bare
by gravity’s maw.
The core of the consumed
casting off its skin
in silent rage
to shimmer
in the stellar tide –
fading in the dark
for all it gave
in vain.
Artistic depiction of a Be star and its disk orbited by a faint, hot, stripped star (Image Credit: William Pounds).
This poem is inspired by recent research, which has detected the faint light of stellar corpses beside predat ..read more
The Poetry of Science
2M ago
In the sunken
Eagle’s nest
silted scripts
tell tales
of ancient skies,
mapped
against the
quickened pulse
and gentle sigh
of life.
Through time’s
unbending lens
stories unfold
in layers of earth –
a chronicle of climate
etched
into an empire’s
heart.
Cold spells,
lined up with
unseen storms
of pestilence,
disease,
death.
As if the Earth itself
sought to dim
the eternal flame.
Every stratum
a vestige
to the enormity
of life,
and the folly
of our designs.
This poem is inspired by recent research, which has found that climate change likely triggered pandemics in antiquity.
Understanding how anc ..read more
The Poetry of Science
2M ago
A riddle wrapped in
burnished dust
turns its
wounded face
towards our gaze –
furrowed brows
guarding tales
of distance,
water,
life.
A canvas of history
stretched out
across this bed
of broken mouths.
Every layer a
story told in pride,
as our envoy’s
dead and certain eyes
peer deep
into the withered
surface soul.
Layers
once flat and plane
now tilt
disrupted,
revealing ghosts
of ancient lakes
calm and still
until
a break.
A pause
before the delta’s birth,
and within
the trembling
hopeful sounds
of flowing,
living,
being.
Mars Perseverance Rover RIMFAX ground penetrating radar measurements of ..read more