A Poem for Saturday: Embrace Me, May 5, 2003
Oh Mother Earth, embrace me with all of your weight. I am pressed into your bosom and like Atlas, I carry the World’s load. I leave the comforts of an orbital womb and am born a second time. Expedition 6 crewmates Ken Bowersox, Nikolai Budarin and I leaving the International ...Read More
A Poem for Saturday: Helen of Earth
Helen of Earth. An Alien force, smitten by the sight of Earth. Stunning occipital pleasure, with a face of such beauty. As to launch a thousand ships, laying siege to our planet, until they can take her as their own. The Kamchatka Coast photographed from the International Space Station 23:27 ...Read More
The Orbital Perspective of Nicholas Kristof
Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Nicholas Kristof was in in the thick of things during the chaotic days of August 2011 that resulted in the Fall of Tripoli. He stood in Libya’s capital city reporting on events as they unfolded. Nick Kristof in Tripoli, Libya August 23, 2011 At the same ...Read More
Astronomy: The Overview Effect for The Rest of Us
Astronomers Without Borders, an organization I founded in 2007, is based on a simple truth – when we look up at the sky, no matter where we are, we know others are doing the same thing from other countries around the world. At similar latitudes the sky is identical regardless ...Read More
From the Diary of a Space Zucchini: Fresh Air
March 20 There was a time where I had no memory; I thought this must be the Great Compost. Since waking I heard Gardener talking to me about what happened. We were transplanted once again into new plastic bags. Our stems and roots were trimmed. Our water diet was replaced ...Read More
From the Diary of a Space Zucchini: My Aching Roots
March 7 I am making a second set of flowers. They are all male flowers, full of fragrance for my crewmates to enjoy. I see Gardener smile. March 8 Oh my aching roots! I am sick; my flower buds have wilted into little brown nubbins. My leaves have a fringe ...Read More
Personal Reality
In space I see things that are not there. Flashes in my eyes, like luminous dancing fairies, give a subtle display of light that is easy to overlook when I’m consumed by normal tasks. But in the dark confines of my sleep station, with the droopy eyelids of pending sleep, ...Read More
A Poem for Saturday: I Wonder Why
I wonder why the sky is up, and why the stars abound? Click for the big picture And why the Sun comes up each morn, and why the Earth goes ’round? I wonder what the Sun on Mars, would bring at dusk and dawn? I wonder what two moons would ...Read More
An Invitation to Participate in the International Space Apps Challenge
Yuri Gagarin was 27 years old when he left the protective atmosphere of Earth, and then returned 108 minutes later with the perspective nearly all of us privileged to follow him would come to understand: “Orbiting Earth in the spaceship, I saw how beautiful our planet is. People, let us ...Read More
From the Diary of a Space Zucchini: Crewmates for Astro-Z
February 20 We have two new crewmates, Sunflower and Broccoli. Sunflower has a long stem for the size of his leaves. He is standing tall. Broccoli is small and weak. His sprout is so small that without the normal gravitational signals, surface tension forces keep his cotyledons from breaking free ...Read More
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