Some possibly tongue in cheek thoughts on those celebrating the latest invasion of Mars.






Man is on Mars again
Kinda
Managed to get
A big beach buggy
With a camera on
Up there
While down here
People cheer on
Fine whatever
If you go in for that
Kinda highfalutin thing
But what gets me
Is who’s doing the cheering
People who on any other
Day of the week
Are morally opposed
Allegedly at least
To things like colonisation
Imperialism
Ah, yes, but
They say
This is for science
Which was exactly one way
Of looking at it
Back in the day
How did Darwin
Get all his evidence after all
Just when it comes
To up in space
We haven’t found anything
We want yet
But the second we do
Mines
Extractions
And Heaven forbid
If whatever we find
Mineral or alien life-form
Tastes good
With our track record
We got no business
Being up anywhere
Man
On the off chance there’s none of the above found, do not fear, for man has always been adept at finding a use for something even if really it’s nonexistent; the real requisite being that a profit can be made.
Mars, while apparently being little more than red soil and dust, has the wonderful advantage of being many moons away; thus anything from there will be attributed value for that very fact alone.
If it doesn’t turn out there’s some major benefits to Mars dust (great for the skin; fantastic for growing roses in; the best pebbledash/roughcast a house has ever known), then undoubtedly its being used as a coating on drives or walls as nothing more than a, ‘oh yes, it’s actual Mars red’ status symbol will just have to very profitably suffice.
If in doubt, both gold and ivory will unhappily testify.
More Poetry:
- Smokin’
- Big dreams and worst nightmares
- Fruit Baskets; a damning indictment
- Idle Zen vs. The Active Capitalist Agenda
Thanks for reading 🙂
N. P. Ryan
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All images from the most recent and previous Mars landings courtesy NASA; except image of entire planet: credit OSIRIS instrument the ESA Rosetta.