Happy Holidays Boomerang Message
by Harley White
- Published: Thursday, December 19 2019 18:40
Nebular Boomerang, as you’re so called,
you look like an hourglass-shaped bow tie,
since your nearly symmetric lobes are sprawled
to remind one more of a butterfly.
Unable to view you with clarity
when with nineteen-eighty scope observed,
it was thought that your bipolarity
suggested boomerang pattern curved.
Then when the sighting was further researched,
with preciser lenses to magnify,
you gained the name Bow Tie, perkily perched
in Centaurus there in the southern sky.
When I first saw you through Hubble’s sharp gaze,
with your image in rainbow-colored sheen
highlighted in stars, so as to amaze,
I was struck by the drama of the scene.
Then I found out serendipitously
something astounding my eyes couldn’t see…
You are literally the coolest place
that is known to exist in outer space!
With gases gushing in powerful jets
and temperature which is just a tad
plus absolute naught, as cold as it gets,
you’ve made astro-watchers exclaim, egad!
Your intriguing structure holds mysteries
with still many secrets to be revealed
of star births and deaths and their histories…
Who knows what new knowledge you yet may yield?
That suggestive ‘Boomerang’ tag has stuck;
and we could use some of your coolness here
where down on this earth we’re running amuck
in our self-made global-warmed atmosphere…
Beautiful Boomerang, please won’t you teach us
how to get onto a better track?
Through light-years of space, may the message reach us
that what we give out will come right back!
Though holiday greetings come once a season
when the old year away will scurry,
for starwatching there’s always a reason
even during the festive flurry.
So why not linger a moment to peer
at empyreal visions above
while wishing, midst celebratory cheer,
for peace in the world, good will, and love?
~ Harley White
* * * * * * * * *
Some sources of inspiration were the following…
My poem “Boomerang Message” revisited for the Holiday Season…
https://astronomerswithoutborders.org/news/awb-blog/311-dark/astropoetry/3470-boomerang-message.html
Hubble Catches Scattered Light from the Boomerang Nebula
http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/opo0525a/
Boomerang Nebula ~ Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boomerang_Nebula
Video ~ with descriptive information below…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5XgGlrxxmI
Image ~ Happy Holidays from the Boomerang Nebula…
https://hubblesite.org/contents/media/images/2005/25/3934-Image.html?page=2&filterUUID=189076b8-633a-49a1-94f8-f19468c3a9bc
About This Image ~ This reflecting cloud of dust and gas has two nearly symmetric lobes of matter that are being ejected from a central star. Over the last 1,500 years, nearly one and a half times the mass of our Sun has been lost by the central star of the Boomerang Nebula.
Credits: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA); Acknowledgment: J. Biretta (STScI)
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