#569 - let's go to Mars

 

24.vii.21

569

2.204

let’s go to Mars

 

I think we’re alone now

there doesn’t seem to be anyone around

          – Ritchie Cordell

 

 

I love my deserts radioactive

poison salt in the soil all around

 

let’s go to Mars

next after the moon

 

nothing to breathe but CO2

(clearly left by an advanced civilization)

and there’s no pollution at all

 

the place has potential

it’s get in on the ground floor

 

let’s go to Mars!

you know you want to

pack a picnic set  

champion lunch

we’ll meet the god of war

 

(right kind of place

to banish the bellicose

and

we’ll find all the lost socks, where else?)  

 

life on earth was too easy for us

problems too simple to solve

 

who doesn’t love a challenge?

should we take the car and the kids?

(questions! questions!)

 

seven months off the air

(Magellan ate rats and old shoes

before he copped it, but he knew…)

 

take me in a tin can

we’ll be the first

 

I mean to say that there’s nobody there

do you think that there might be a reason?

 

but let’s go to Mars anyway

 

you won’t see the sea

but fossick for ice

think of it as a kind of stay-cation

 

on Mars

salute the blue dot when it rises

and long for an opposition

 

after a short while there, you’ll sing

‘fly me to the moon’

(meaning the base on the way back home)

 

no sea, no lake, no river as such

though you can see where they’ve been

 

Olympos Mons more than twice the height of Everest

it’s quite the view up there

let’s go

let’s take rover – no roads

the ultimate 4WD adventure!

a voice is telling me to!

 

and you could get religion there

‘take a closer walk with thee’

puffed up in a lovely suit

 

yes, all those earworms in my head

are music of another sphere

 

and they have tinnitus as well

helmet hair (spittoon style)

if you get inside

…we’re the hum, I think

 

need to find out if there’s night life on Mars

need to find a favourite Martian

then I’ll have it made

 

no shade as such

(no trees, nothing built)

but not much sun either

because of the dust storms

and because we’re so far away

 

really a challenge for global warming

 

but let’s go to Mars

it’s romantic

and like I said

no one has been before

 

Schiaparelli must have gone to Venice once

and I want to see the canals

 

hop skip and a not much gravity

we’ll get the weight of the world off our shoulders

we can go up in a weather balloon

 

muscle waste, bone loss, cardio challenges

huh!

is that all you’ve got?

 

let’s go to Mars

we’ve already named everything there

it’s time to plant a flag by hand

and say ‘you had to have been there’

 

pack lots of winter woollies, you’ll need ’em

pump up the reverse cycle

set the blanket on high

 

I’ve already got Mars on Ten Dollars a Day

…all the inflation risk is at home

 

and though the year is twice as long

days are much the same

 

of course there’s the radiation and cancer

and the dust’s electrostatic, sticks in your lungs like glue

 

but hey, it’s a doddle compared with Venus

we could live under ice and dust

(tumulus to the casual observer

but we won’t have any of those

bar drones and bots and droids, AIs)

 

we’ll watch pictures of the surface in real time

(without that delay, as on Earth)

you can see the advantages, can’t you!

we’ll learn so much just by being there

 

we may have to bury the last lot who tried

at least they’re a sort of organic matter

 

those two little moons are a bit of a joke

(and on the way out I believe)

but Mars itself is solid prospect

less dense than what we’re used to

but at least you can walk on it

take a care!

 

it’s just as round

be of good cheer

we’ll brew our own in time

 

let’s go to Mars

wot-the-hell (it will be)!

 

I only want to have a look

 

it’s one more world

and this red planet

will be much more of a challenge to cook

 

this is our red dust destiny

Martian kids will laugh at us later

for doubting that would be there!