Below are four poems that I wrote for a Creative Writing class. The project was to pick a research topic, and then do some sort of creative writing based on that research, whether it was in the form of a short story, poetry, podcast episode, or something else. I decided to research several different exoplanets (planets outside of our solar system) and write poems inspired by some of them.
Teegarden’s Star b
“Would you like another cup?”
Assent, and she pours
We clink our cups across a stitched tablecloth
I don’t spill on the embroidery
We take our sips in quiet unison
Touching our lips to cold ceramic and hot liquid
It burns my tongue, but I smile
I feel the steam behind my eyes,
As my throat is scorched
I take a deep breath
The air is cool,
The breeze carries water and the scent of flowers
I take in the soothing breath, and become like the petals
Gifting their scent to wind, drifting onto the table
One petal touched the embroidery, and I stare
I don’t see the one that lands in my tea
And then I do
Suddenly, my long skirts feel heavy
I look down, they are soaked with the water of an ocean around me
The air turns thin, and I fall off my stone perch, into the water
I grasp at the tablecloth
My tea spills, embroidery ruined
I hit the water
As my skirts float around me, I realize
I am the petal
Floating on the water’s surface
Proxima Centauri b
Why do you spin so far away from me?
Your orbit is near, but not near enough.
You’ve traveled far across an ageless sea
Past every island and rocky bluff.
Gazing at you, your golden eye stares back
I’ve never seen you turn away from me.
One of three jewels in the inky black,
And yet, you are the only one I see.
I long to pull you into my safety
While you are stripped bare by waves of anger
Your air pulled away in a silent plea
‘Til you float in languorous surrender.
I watch your distant orbit helplessly,
Unable to answer your call to me.
LkCa 15 c
Quiet child
Silent wanderer
Far from me you wait, enshrouded
Years away, we share our time
However short it may be
My precious son
An outcast in the ageless sky
I beckon you closer in my endless search,
But your face is strange to me, and,
I realize
I don’t know you anymore.
Janssen
A great ship floats on ever-burning seas
Hull of stone and metal and dark scorches
Scraping through rock that never stops melting
Carving a red hot trail of bloody flames
The mast creaks under ever-crushing weight
Yet the ship’s vast shape is held together
By centuries of masterful design.
Flocks of embers float above the terrain
Pulled by gusts of wind into the night sky
The sun never graces these shifting grounds
Instead the embers mingle with the stars
Who are not distant suns but far-off mirrors
Reflections of the flames within us all
A soft barrier to an empty sky.
While the great ship traverses this dark land
A sailor of granite skin and steel bones
Cries out across the border between light
His lungs the bellows to the air of flame
Carrying his message across the void
To sisters of blood and brothers to land
A family among glittering skies.
Teegarden’s Star b was originally published in Issue 128 of Dreams & Nightmares Magazine.
To learn more about exoplanets, check out Exoplanets – NASA Science.
Summers Of Beans 
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