Stars

I am studying a short online course on Astronomy. It  is called "In the night Sky Orion" and I assumed that it would be only about that constellation, but it goes much deeper and wider than that.
We are introduced to the classification of different kinds of stars as well as different kinds of galaxies. We are told about black holes, dark matter and dark energy, We find out about the Big Bang Theory and the possible end of the Universe.

Learning about the Universe is both stimulating and daunting.  Although it is intended to be a very basic course, a lot of the more technical stuff is not all that easy to grasp and the huge size of the enormous distances and the length of the time involved is almost impossible for me to get my mind around.

I am enjoying the whole course, but one of the best parts is going out at the same time each night and observing Orion. We are supposed to take a photo of Orion once a week, but this is beyond me. Either my camera is not good enough or I am not using it properly, but all I get is a black space. So I just stand and stare at this group of stars in the sky and it is very beautiful. Although I haven't been able to get pictures of Orion  have been able to see that Orion has moved (relative to the earth, not the other stars) and is further overhead than when I started observations three weeks ago.

My Poem about Orion

LEARNING ABOUT ORION

In the constellation of Orion

somewhere halfway between

Red giant Betelgeuse

and White giant Rigel, lies

Orion Nebula, a fuzzy place, a womb

where stars are born.

As Orion sweeps across the sky,

his hunting dogs beside him,

chasing the Pleiedes, bow at the ready,

he carries below his belt the seeds

of suns. They swirl in multi-coloured clouds

of purple, yellow, green and blue.

In the wide disc which gathers round

a sphere that will become a new young sun,

are bits of debris, which, with dust

and ashes from celestial conflagrations

might form, after a million years

another Earth like ours

Name a constellation

Here is a drawing of the constellation The Aardvark.  I downloaded the picture of the stars, made a tracing and then did the not very artistic drawing.

THE STORY OF THE AARDVARK

Kalulu the rabbit was speaking to King Lion. "O Great King," he said. "All the kings on this earth have beautiful palaces to live in, but you, one of the greatest of them all, still sleep under a scrubby thorn tree.  Why don't you have a palace built to show your subjects how great you are?"
"Who can I get to build me a palace?" asked King Lion.

"The ants are the best builders, " said Kalulu. "Just look at that big ant hill they have built. Shall I ask them to build a palace for you."
"Yes," said the king. "Tell them to build a palace fit for the King of all the Beasts." and he shook his black mane and gave a roar to show what a great king he was.
So Kalulu the rabbit ran off and informed the ants that  King Lion had ordered them to build him a new home and the ants called all their friends and relations together and  started to build at once.
 Aardvark heard King Loin roaring. He went to see what was going on.  When he saw lines and lines of ants streaming to the place where the palace was to be built, he drooled with joy. He unrolled his long tongue and gobbled up all the ants. When King Lion came to inspect the site of his palace, he saw no building at all.
"What is the meaning of this, " he asked Kalulu.
""Please, O Great King," said Kalulu. " It is the aardvark's fault.. He has eaten all the ants that were going to build your palace."
King Lion was very angry. He grabbed  Aardvark by his tail and flung him high up into the sky. And there Aardvark is still. you can see him at night trying to gobble up the stars.

The Best of the Christmas Season

Such a busy week! But so great to have friends that want my company. I am so blessed!
There was:
A braai with Joy on Saturday, lunch with Sindiwe at Steenberg on Tuesday. Tea with Leslie and Maggie on Thursday and Christmas dinner with my darlings Luke and Danielle( and also Tyler and Sindiwe) on Christmas day. And then there was the Carol service we had at Evergreen. Just a few readings and our choir leading the residents in "Away in a Manger" etc.  But I think the best was the carol singing on Christmas Eve.
Our imitation of the "waits" had its ridiculous side--  the straggling procession of us geriatrics battling with our sticks and walkers to keep up with Viv tHart in her motorised wheelchair and the occasional false start when we got off on the wrong note(literally) But the residents enjoyed it( all except one scrooge who slammed his window shut on us) and the choir enjoyed it too. The sweetest moment was when dear Eleanor who doesn't know who or where she is most of the time, burst into song when she heard us sing "Silent Night' and she and Allen gave us "Stille Nacht" as a duet.

Second attempt

Is this one going to work? I think it is a video  of  Yolande and Zoe.

vidoes

I am having another shot at downloading videos.

This is the first jumping trial on Saturday. Elisabeth and Halo on the course.

Kommetjie

The U3A Fynbos Ramble yesterday was at Kommetjie, Of the slow group of walkers only Anne and I were there. The main group went up Rubbi Road. We drove down to the parking lot by the beach at Kommetjie and then walked along the board walk to the light house. I was a little envious of the others. I knew there were lots of interesting flowers to be seen on the hillside, but, probably because were walked so slowly, we did find quite few  plants in flower even though it was so late in the year. And of course it was a very pleasant walk as it always is with beautiful views of the sea and the mountains.

 

Some New Poems

The Motorway

On the False Bay end walls hide 
a suburbia of cottages and flats

and a graveyard with small crosses 

and jars of artificial flowers. Funerals

clog the road  on Saturdays, but in the week

it slinks with dogs and tik-heads,

crawls with girls and boys − schooldays 

with satchels, Sundays  to the beach with towels.

Today is Monday so there’s washing in backyards

A pair of boys push Supermarket trolleys,

piled with a harvest of suburban dirt-bins.

Men stand by the roadside on the Southern side.

One holds a paintbrush and a pan, another

stares out dull-eyed, a shovel by his side

still shiny after weeks of waiting.

At a rubbish-strewn alleyway entrance

drugs and gossip are traded in the afternoons

−.a dead body in one of the upstairs flats.

been there for two days, they say.

Yes, this is gangland, isn’t it?

A church, a school, a mosque, a shopping mall, 
the spaces between them strewn with plastic bags,

bent tins and cool-drink bottles.

But among the tenements, succulents are

struggling to survive in a guerrilla garden

and someone has planted lavender bushes

by a blue-washed wall

THE DOG AGILITY  TRIAL

The course flows like a piece of verse.

Spaces between words −

green grass between obstacles.

Numbers show line breaks,

commas and semicolons, pauses

for twists and turns. Some jumps

are words not to be taken straight.

You must go round them and

approach them from a different angle.

A tunnel curve hides meaning for

a moment; then a mid-stanza

see-saw shatters concentration before

a leap in another direction.

A struggle up a frame comes next.

A stop, another leap and then

a smooth run leads towards

a surprise ending.

.
WIND AT NIGHT

Tonight I listen to the wind’s soft groans.

They sound like cattle lowing.

The cows that used to graze here by the vlei

have all been moved to other fields.

But when I lived in George

my neighbour used to keep a dairy herd

and cows grazed in the field behind our house.

One Sunday night my neighbour’s wife called me

to help them pull a calf. Four of us there were

to strain on ropes tied round the legs. 

Little, black hooves came first,

then a brown soft-nosed head.

At last the whole body gurgled and plopped down

onto hard earth, and the calf lay there panting,

waiting to be licked to life.

and as she nudged it, the cow mooed

softly like the moaning wind