Poems: Space dreams

I quit my first job last month. The company had some amazing and passionate human beings. I had never come across so many like-minded people in one place.

While I was there, I could share my love for space without restrictions and learn so much. In particular, I enjoyed working with and hanging out with two people. And so before I left, I wrote a poem for each of them. I’m sharing those here, having received their permission.

The first poem is for a person who has been an amazing mentor and a friend.

The first view of our galaxy

The first view of our galaxy awaits,
the lights of billions of suns

Yet each star a destination of its own,
out of reach for millennia unknown

You see, us a species still stuck on Earth,
our ability to unshackle still a dearth

Await the Moon, the asteroids and a blue Mars,
at its dawn is but a gaze at the stars

Though without the will and wit to pull it off,
an interplanetary dream by itself isn’t enough

Need an eye for the details,
a rigor to pickup leftover trails

An incessant readiness for discourse and critic,
and the patience to inspire and teach

All of this is what you possess,
with a forgiving nature, no less

Every such Sol can we not iterate,
and set ablaze our species to proliferate

Need but a gravity assist to set things straight,
beyond which the first view of our galaxy awaits.

The second poem is for the friend whom I've had resonating conversations with, and had fun identifying insects together.

We dream, we must

We dream, we must!
Or risk our species blown to dust

For a future that lies beyond the sky,
the time to act is nigh

An orchestrated descent on the Moon,
and an iterative rendezvous with an asteroid

Budge on with your dream,
and get past the crater’s rim

For you have not just the innate curiosity,
but also the warmth of empathy

The persistence to crack the 7 minutes of terror,
and then be the solar system torch bearer

A whirl around Jupiter,
and a landing on Europa

A dive through the rings of Saturn,
and a glide above the seas of Titan

The first orbit around mysterious Uranus,
and a swift passage through Triton’s geysers

With your perseverance and might,
leap all the way to peaks of eternal light.