Competition 3370 invited poems about the predicament of the Nasa astronauts stranded on the ISS – thanks to Paul Freeman for this suggestion. There was a wide range of ideas about how they could use their time, from self–improvement to… other things. Due to a different space issue, many good entries had to be jettisoned, but those below win £25.
Five miles a second, travelling at speed,
Recycling the water we’ve formerly weed,
Dusk follows dawn every hour and thirty,
There’s too much to do to be shouty or shirty –We came for a week, but our taxi was iffy;
No need to be uppity, none to be sniffy –
The wires need testing, experiments checked,
Back in the spring, so we hope and expect –We eat what we like when we raid the reserves;
We’ve no time to get on our crew members’ nerves –
The Middle East rages, the Russians throw wobblers;
Up here we say that all conflict is cobblers –The camera’s off now. You jackass, you moron!
What do you mean that there isn’t a war on?
Light-headed, hair up like Frankenstein’s Bride!
Let’s settle this argument quickly. Outside!Bill Greenwell
A half a year or so in space
Is neither here nor there,
For those who like a rinseless soap
To squeeze upon their hair.It’s time to try Mongolian,
To conjugate its verbs,
Or saunter through auxiliaries
Beloved of the Serbs.And why not read the smallish print
On contracts one’s agreed?
How regular’s the shuttle craft
They said was ‘guaranteed’?Remember all those Christmas cards
(‘Oh, let us meet this year!’)
And start to make some astral calls
To friends who wait in fear…Nicholas Lee
We’ve had the leisure to confirm perspective’s overrated.
We’ve done the ride, we’ve seen the view – our zest for quest’s deflated.
A meteor has landed on our work-life balance scale,
When we set off we did not plan for cosmonauting jail.
You might think that your colleague’s fab, perhaps that they’re a blast?
Take them to a space station, the feeling will not last.
There’s nothing much but time up here so we’ve been making plans.
Please like, subscribe and donate to our astro OnlyFansJuliet Radcliffe
They held a kind of freshers’ day
Of groups that we could meet and rate.
We were surprised by the array
In which we could participate.
Our choice was to put on a play
And both of us now have a role
As people sent from far away
With orders by remote control.
We work at learning lines each day,
We run the whole play now and then,
And Elon Musk says he will pay
To stage it when we’re home again.
Come and see – sooner or later –
Harold Pinter’s The Dumb Waiter.David Blakey
When we’re drifting in space at an orbital pace
And the Earth’s a blue speck in the distance,
And we’re not in the mood for the concentrate food
That is all we have here for subsistence,
We need recreation because our space station
Is limited in its amenities
And the window shows space, and then space and more space,
And oh what a desolate scene it is.Things could have gone wrong if before very long
Our thoughts hadn’t got pornographic
With sweet contemplations of nice conjugations
(My own taste inclines to the sapphic).
If it wasn’t for choosing to share all such musings,
I fear that we might have gone bonkers:
Prudes may not approve, but when we’re in the groove,
Time flies – and ennui never conquers.George Simmers
We few, we happy few, in cramped conditions,
We Major Toms in orbit, bored to bits,
Reduced to urine-drinking competitions,
Are desperate to exercise our wits.
We’ve found that hide-and-seek has limitations,
Played Snap, learnt languages, named half the stars,
Spent months in cogent thought and meditations,
Done jigsaws, rated albums, chocolate bars.
So we’ve reported noises, inexplicable,
A tapping, banging echo out in space.
It’s odd, we say. No cause can be applicable –
Asked Nasa, can they source it, find a trace?
Next we’ll send garbled warnings from the station,
Then cut-off screams that cannot be explained,
Cry ‘SOS! An alien invasion!’
It’s childish, but it keeps us entertained.Janine Beacham
We’ve seen every movie, read every damn book,
Carried out all the maintenance checks,
Both sick of the sight
Of the sky, day and night;
And no, Butch, we’re not having sex!Look out the windows and what do we see?
A big bunch of stars, plus the moon;
With due thanks to Boeing
We won’t yet be going
Back home, or back anywhere soon…Sartre assures us, ‘L’enfer, c’est les autres’ –
Not existentially true;
For in our special case
While we’re stranded in space
I’m your hell, Sunita; mine’s you.Mike Morrison
No. 3373: It is what it is
‘Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.’ You’re invited to write a passage or poem that incorporates this notion, substituting the cigar for another object if you want (16 lines/150 words max). Please email entries to competition@spectator.co.uk by 23 October.
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