Science and Naturalism in Poetry
Poems on science and nature.
Folksonomies: nature science poetry poems
Memes
A Sunset Bloom
Then we sat on the sand for some time and observed How the oceans that cover the world were perturbed By the tides from the orbiting moon overhead "How relaxing the sound of the waves is," you said. I began to expound upon tidal effects When you asked me to stop, looking somewhat perplexed So I did not explain why the sunset turns red And we watched the occurrence in silence instead.Lieutenant Commander Data (2338 – 2379)
Ode to Spot
Felis catus is your taxonomic nomenclature, An endothermic quadruped, carnivorous by nature. Your visual, olfactory, and auditory senses Contribute to your hunting skills and natural defenses. I find myself intrigued by your subvocal oscillations, A singular development of cat communications That obviates your basic hedonistic predilection For a rhythmic stroking of your fur to demonstrate affection. A tail is quite essential for your acrobatic talents. You would not be so agile if you lacked...Lieutenant Commander Data (2338 – 2379)
Cosmic Gall
Neutrinos, they are very small. They have no charge and have no mass And do not interact at all. The earth is just a silly ball To them, through which they simply pass. Like dustmaids down a drafty hall Or photons through a sheet of glass. They snub the most exquisite gas, Ignore the most substantial wall, Cold shoulder steel and sounding brass. Insult the stallion in his stall, And, scorning barriers of class. Infiltrate you and me. Like tall And painless guillotines, they fall ...Neutrinos wonderful or crass?
The Kiss Precise
Four circles to the kissing come, The smaller are the benter. The bend is just the inverse of The distance from the centre. Though their intrigue left Euclid dumb There's now no need for rule of thumb. Since zero bend's a dead straight line And concave bends have minus sign, The sum of squares of all four bends Is half the square of their sum.If four circles A, B, C, and D, of radii r1, r2, r3, and r4, are drawn so that they do not overlap but each touches the other three, and if we let b1 = 1/r1, etc., then
(b1 b2 b3 b4)^2 = 2(b1^2 b2^2 b3^2 b4^2).
Microscopes are Prudent
Faith is a fine invention For gentlemen who see; But microscopes are prudent In an emergency.The Unknowable
This girl was perhaps not born of a mother. But blossomed in a peach tree: Her love fades Quicker than peach-flowers. Although I know her soft body I cannot sound out her heart; Yet we have but to make a few lines on a chart And the distance of the farthest stars In the sky can be measured.Poem about love and science.
The Universe has No Obligation
A man said to the universe: 'Sir, I exist:' 'However,' replied the universe, 'The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation.'The New Sinai
And as of old from Sinai's top God said that God is one. By Science strict so speaks he now To tell us there is None. Earth goes by chemic forces; Heaven's A Mecanique Celeste. And heart and mind of human kind A watch-work as the rest.The mechanical view of the cosmos.
Twinkle, twinkle little star
Twinkle, twinkle little star. I don't wonder what you are, For by spectroscopic ken I know that you are hydrogen.verse by Lewis Fry Richardson or Ian D. Bush
The Brainy Baboon
There was once a brainy baboon, Who always breathed down a bassoon, For he said, 'It appears That in billions of years I shall certainly hit on a tune'.Cute poem on evolution.
Science Destroys Magic
Science! true daughter of Old Time thou art! alterest all things with thy peering eyes. preyest thou thus upon the poet's heart, Vulture, whose wings are dull realities? How should he love thee? or how deem thee wise, Who wouldst not leave him in his wandering. To seek for treasure in the jewelled skies, Albeit he soared with an undaunted wing? Hast thou not dragged Diana from her car? And driven the Hamadryad from the wood To seek a shelter in some happier star? Hast thou not torn the Naiad ...Science kills gods and scares fairies from the forest.
Becoming More by Dying
I died as mineral and became a plant, I died as plant and rose to animal, I died as animal and I became man. Why should I fear? When was I less by dying?An interesting poem.
Big Whorls, Little Whorls
Big whorls have little whorls Which feed on their velocity And little whorls have lesser whorls, And so on to viscosity.A play on the poem about fleas and little fleas.
Relativity
I like relativity and quantum theories because I don't understand them and they make me feel as if space shifted about like a swan that can't settle, refusing to sit still and be measured; and as if the atom were an impulsive thing always changing its mind.A poem
The Sane Universe
One might talk about the sanity of the atom the sanity of space the sanity of the electron the sanity of water— For it is all alive and has something comparable to that which we call sanity in ourselves. The only oneness is the oneness of sanity.A poem. Replace "sanity" with "empirical reality".
The Enquiry
How near one Species to the next is join'd, The due Gradations please a thinking Mind; and there are Creatures which no eye can see, That for a Moment live and breathe like me: Whom a small Fly in bulk as far exceeds, As yon tall Cedar does the waving Reeds: These we can reach—and may we not suppose There still are Creatures more minute than those.Creatures joined with gradations and wildly diverse.
The Dinosaur: A Poem
Behold the mighty dinosaur, Famous in prehistoric lore, Not only for his power and strength But for his intellectual length. You will observe by these remains The creature had two sets of brains— One in his head (the usual place), The other at his spinal base. Thus he could reason 'A priori' As well as 'A posteriori'. No problem bothered him a bit He made both head and tail of it. So wise was he, so wise and solemn, Each thought filled just a spinal column. If one brain found the pressure str...About how dinosaurs have two brains, one in the rear (don't know if this is true or not, but I remember hearing this).
Famous Tree Poem
I think that I shall never see A poem as lovely as a tree. A tree whose hungry mouth is prest Against the earth's sweet flowing breast; A tree that looks at God all day, And lifts her leafy arms to pray; A tree that may in Summer wear A nest of robins in her hair; Upon whose bosom snow has lain; Who intimately lives with rain. Poems are made by fools like me, But only God can make a tree.Instills a sense of wonder.
Poem About Evolution as a Film
Evolution: At the Mind's Cinema I turn the handle and the story starts: Reel after reel is all astronomy, Till life, enkindled in a niche of sky, Leaps on the stage to play a million parts. Life leaves the slime and through all ocean darts; She conquers earth, and raises wings to fly; Then spirit blooms, and learns how not to die,- Nesting beyond the grave in others' hearts. I turn the handle: other men like me Have made the film: and now I sit and look In quiet, privileged like Divinity To r...With the observer privileged.
Sarcastic Science
Sarcastic Science, she would like to know, In her complacent ministry of fear, How we propose to get away from here When she has made things so we have to go Or be wiped out. Will she be asked to show Us how by rocket we may hope to steer To some star off there, say, a half light-year Through temperature of absolute zero? Why wait for Science to supply the how When any amateur can tell it now? The way to go away should be the same As fifty million years ago we came— If anyone remembers how th...A poem about science arguing we need to go to the stars, but it has made it so we must leave Earth. I wonder if Frost is referring to extinction as the way to go?
�Faith� is a fine invention
"Faith" is a fine invention When Gentlemen can see— But Microscopes are prudent In an Emergency.But microscopes are prudent.
The Universe Holds no Obligations
A man said to the universe: 'Sir, I exist!' 'However,' replied the universe, 'The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation.'The fact of our existence does not mean the Universe owes us anything.
Newton, Adam, and the Apple
When Newton saw an apple fall, he found In that slight startle from his contemplation— 'Tis said (for I'll not answer above ground For any sage's creed or calculation)— A mode of proving that the earth turn'd round In a most natural whirl, called 'gravitation'; And this is the sole mortal who could grapple, Since Adam, with a fall, or with an apple.A poem by Lord Byron.
What opposite discoveries we have seen!
What opposite discoveries we have seen! (Signs of true genius, and of empty pockets.) One makes new noses, one a guillotine, One breaks your bones, one sets them in their sockets; But vaccination certainly has been A kind antithesis to Congreve's rockets, ...From science, bombs and immunizations, guillotines and life-saving surgery. A poem by Lord Byron.
The Age of New Inventions
This is the patent-age of new inventions For killing bodies, and for saving souls, All propagated with the best intentions; Sir Humphrey Davy's lantern, by which coals Are safely mined for in the mode he mentions, Tombuctoo travels, voyages to the Poles, Are ways to benefit mankind, as true, Perhaps, as shooting them at Waterloo.Lord Byron marvels at the scientific wonders of his age.
The Ascent of Man in Poem Form
Apes lifting hairy arms now stand And free the wonder?working hand. They raise a light aërial house On shafts of widely branching trees, Where, harboured warily, each spouse May feed her little ape in peace, Green cradled in his heaven?roofed bed, Leaves rustling lullabies o’erhead. And lo, ’mid reeking swarms of earth Grim struggling in the primal wood, A new strange creature hath its birth: Wild—stammering—nameless—shameless—nude; Spurred on by want, held in by fear, He hides his he...From apes with freed hands to muddled-thinking man in caves, up to clearer-thinking man with fire. A very nice passage about evolution.
Shelley Sonnet on Ballooning
Bright ball of flame that thro the gloom of even Silently takes thine ethereal way And with surpassing glory dimmst each ray Twinkling amid the dark blue depth of Heaven; Unlike the Fire thou bearest, soon shalt thou Fade like a meteor in surrounding gloom, Whilst that, unquenchable, is doomed to glow A watch-light by the patriot’s lonely tomb, A ray of courage to the opprest and poor…The balloon as a "ray of courage."
Humphery Davy: Poem About a Weeping Monument
My eye is wet with tears For I see the white stones That are covered with names The stones of my forefathers’ graves. No grass grows upon them For deep in the earth In darkness and silence the organs of life To their primitive atoms return. Through ages the air Has been moist with their blood The ages the seeds of the thistle has fed On what was once motion and form... Thoughts roll not beneath the dust No feeling is in the cold grave They have leaped to other worlds They are far above the...There are various versions of this early poem in the HD Archive: see Paris, vol 1, p29; Treneer, pp4-5; or Fullmer, p13
The Mouse's Petition
(Found in the trap where he had been confined all night by Dr. Priestley, for the sake of making experiments with different kinds of air.) OH! hear a pensive prisoner's prayer, For liberty that sighs; And never let thine heart be shut Against the prisoner's cries! For here forlorn and sad I sit, Within the wiry grate; And tremble at th' approaching morn, Which brings impending fate. If e'er thy breast with freedom glowed, And spurned a tyrant's chain, Let not thy strong oppressive force A ...A poem by Anna Laetitia Barbauld that is considered the spark of the movement for the humane treatment of animals in scientific experimentation.
Keats Against "Cold Philosophy"
...Do not all charms fly At the mere touch of cold philosophy? There was an awful rainbow once in heaven: We know her woof, her texture; she is given In the dull catalogue of common things. Philosophy will clip an Angel’s wings, Conquer all mysteries by rule and line, Empty the haunted air, and gnomed mine - Unweave a rainbow, as it erewhile made The tender-person’d Lamia melt into a shade.An anti-science passage from the poem "Lamia."
Davy Poem Using Laws of Conservation and Thermodynamics
In a thoughtful mood Davy wrote a new kind of metaphysical poem, ‘The Massy Pillars of the Earth. It reflects on the human condition, and suggests that since nothing is ever destroyed in the physical universe, only transformed (the First Law of Thermodynamics), then man himself must be immortal in some spiritual sense. It also returns in a new way to Davy’s early Cornish beliefs about starlight as the source of all energy in the universe: Nothing is lost; the ethereal fire, Which from the fa...A poem found in Humphry Davy Works.
You Are Speeding Around the Sun
Thou art speeding round the sun Brightest world of many a one; Green and azure sphere which shinest With a light which is divinest Among all the lamps of Heaven To whom light and life is given; I, thy crystal paramour Borne beside thee by a power Like the polar Paradise, Magnet-like of lovers’ eyes; I, a most enamoured maiden Whose weak brain is overladen With the pleasure of her love, Maniac-like around thee move Gazing, an insensiate bride, On thy form from every side ..."Brightest world of many a one," ... prescient words from Shelley.
Pioneer 10 Poetry
For me, some of the most moving responses to the message are the works of art and poetry that it evoked. Mr. 'Aim Morhardt is a painter of water colors of the desert and sierras who lives in Bishop, California, where, perhaps not coincidentally, the giant Goldstone tracking station, which commands Pioneer 10, is located. Mr. Morhardt's poem follows: Pioneer 10: The Golden Messenger. The dragon prows that cruised the northern seas, Questing adventure with the fighting clan; The gallant merma...Two poems inspired by the Pioneer 10 probe. Surely the first of many.
Dinosauria, We
Born like this Into this As the chalk faces smile As Mrs. Death laughs As the elevators break As political landscapes dissolve As the supermarket bag boy holds a college degree As the oily fish spit out their oily prey As the sun is masked We are Born like this Into this Into these carefully mad wars Into the sight of broken factory windows of emptiness Into bars where people no longer speak to each other Into fist fights that end as shootings and knifings Born into this Into hospitals which ...A poem filled with fantastic imagery of the decline and fall of Western civilization.
"Look for Me Under Your Bootsoles"
I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun, I effuse my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags. I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love, If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.Walt Whitman comments on his demise.
Medicine Works in Great Leaps
Medicinal discovery, It moves in mighty leaps, It leapt straight past the common cold And gave it us for keeps....leaving us little things like the common cold.
The Art of Preserving Health
The blood, the fountain whence the spirits flow, The generous stream that waters every part, And motion, vigour, and warm life conveys To every Particle that moves or lives; This vital fluid, thro' unnumber'd tubes Pour'd by the heart, and to the heart again Refunded; scourg'd forever round and round; Enrag'd with heat and toil, at last forgets Its balmy nature; virulent and thin It grows; and now, but that a thousand gates Are open to its flight, it would destroy The parts it cherish' d and ...A poem by John Armstrong.
Science the "Fair Effusive Ray"
SCIENCE! thou fair effusive ray From the great source of mental Day, Free, generous, and refin'd! Descend with all thy treasures fraught, Illumine each bewilder'd thought, And bless my labour'g mind.That illuminates bewildered thoughts and blesses the laboring mind.
What Do We Plant When We Plant the Tree?
What do we plant when we plant the tree? We plant the ship, which will cross the sea. We plant the mast to carry the sails; We plant the planks to withstand the gales— The keel, the keelson, and beam and knee; We plant the ship when we plant the tree. What do we plant when we plant the tree? We plant the houses for you and me. We plant the rafters, the shingles, the floors, We plant the studding, the lath, the doors, The beams and siding, all parts that be; We plant the house when we plant t...We plant all the things we get from trees.
Lyrics to Storm
Inner North London, top floor flatAll white walls, white carpet, white cat,Rice Paper partitionsModern art and ambitionThe host’s a physician,Lovely bloke, has his own practiceHis girlfriend’s an actressAn old mate from homeAnd they’re always great fun.So to dinner we’ve come. The 5th guest is an unknown,The hosts have just thrownUs together for a favourbecause this girl’s just arrived from AustraliaAnd has moved to North LondonAnd she’s the sister of someoneOr has some connection.As we make ...A beat poem that is hilarious in its defense of skepticism against pseudoscience.
A Beautiful Quote on Wonder
31 I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey work of the stars, And the pismire is equally perfect, and a grain of sand, and the egg of the wren, And the tree-toad is a chef-d'oeuvre for the highest, And the running blackberry would adorn the parlors of heaven, And the narrowest hinge in my hand puts to scorn all machinery, And the cow crunching with depress'd head surpasses any statue, And a mouse is miracle enough to stagger sextillions of infidels.From Walt Whitman on the wonder all around us. Especially enjoy the "a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars" part.
A Poem About What Makes Humans Unique
When I undertook to answer My own 1927 self-questioning: "Why have humans been included In the design of Universe?" My hypothetical answer of 1927 Was, and as yet is: What impresses me most Is the experientially demonstrable fact That all living organisms Other than humans Have some organically integral equipment That gives them some inherent Physical advantage In coping with special environmental conditions-- A plant that can and does thrive Only under dense Amazon River jungle conditions-- ...In comparison to other species and our place in the universe from Buckminster Fuller.
Poem: Behold the Mighty Dinosaur
Behold the mighty dinosaur, Famous in prehistoric lore, Not only for his power and strength But for his intellectual length. You will observe by these remains The creature had two sets of brains - One in his head (the usual place), The other at his spinal base, Thus he could reason A priori As well as A posteriori. No problem bothered him a bit He made both head and tail of it. So wise was he, so wise and solemn, Each thought filled just a spinal column. If one brain found the pressure strong...By Bert Leston Taylor (1866-1921).
The Temple of Nature
Birth after birth the line unchanging runs, And fathers live transmitted in their sons; Each passing year beholds the unvarying kinds, The same their manners, and the same their minds. Till, as erelong successive buds decay, And insect-shoals successive pass away, Increasing wants the pregnant parent vex With the fond wish to form a softer sex....A poem by Erasmus Darwin.
The Circle of the Brain cannot be Squared
A Circle round divided in four partsHath been great Study 'mongst the men of Arts;Since Archimed's or Euclid's time, each BrainHath on a Line been stretched, yet all in Vain;And every Thought hath been a Figure set,Doubts Cyphers were, Hopes as Triangles met;There was Division and Subtraction made,And Lines drawn out, and Points exactly laid,But none hath yet by Demonstration foundThe way, by which to Square a Circle round:For while the Brain is round, no Square will be,While Thoughts divi...A poem about the brain, quantification, and human curiosity.
Discovery By Wislawa Szymborska
I believe in the great discovery. I believe in the man who will make the discovery. I believe in the fear of the man who will make the discovery. I believe in his face going white, His queasiness, his upper lip drenched in cold sweat. I believe in the burning of his notes, burning them into ashes, burning them to the last scrap. I believe in the scattering of numbers, scattering them without regret. I believe in the man's haste, in the precision of his movements, in his free will. ...A chilling and insightful poem about faith and how it blinds people to evidence.
On the Nature of Things...
No single thing abides; but all things flow. Fragment to fragment clings-the things thus grow Until we know and name them. By degrees They melt, and are no more the things we know. Globed from the atoms falling slow or swift I see the suns, I see the systems lift Their forms; and even the systems and the suns Shall go back slowly to the eternal drift. You too, oh earth-your empires, lands, and seas - Least with your stars, of all the galaxies, Globed from the drift like these, like these you ...An ancient poem on the nature of reality and science as the guiding light.
Evolution by Langdon Smith
When you were a tadpole and I was a fish In the Paleozoic time, And side by side on the ebbing tide We sprawled through the ooze and slime, Or skittered with many a caudal flip Through the depths of the Cambrian fen, My heart was rife with the joy of life, For I loved you even then. Mindless we lived and mindless we loved And mindless at last we died; And deep in the rift of the Caradoc drift We slumbered side by side. The world turned on in the lathe of time, The hot lands hea...A wonderful, inspiring poem about a love that lasts across a multitude of lifetimes and species as they evolve over time.