For National Poetry Month, I’m sharing poems each day, one that I’ve written followed by whatever one from three sites that share a poem a day that strikes my fancy that day.

In the early 2000s, when this poem was written, my wife and I had gotten rid of our cable and we often listened to the radio. One of the things to which we listened regularly was National Public Radio, and you could, and still can, hear some pretty interesting things there.

Among Things You Learn On NPR

1.

It's called the Dardas Mission,
and tonight 1.4 million people,
who signed their names on silicone paper,
are on that mission in a capsule
in a space probe, ready to go 
through the comet's tail in 2006,
and beyond, if all goes
according to plan. 

Astronomers theorize the comet will stay in orbit
around the sun, or will remain
in space, to hit a planet, or go out of the solar system,
"which is more likely," says the optimistic
scientist on the phone from Houston.
20 billion years from now,
those names etched in silicone
will be the surviving artifacts of
our system, he says. 

2. 

In Bam, at least 30,000 people die,
but the survivors blog on
in forums for freedom of expression.  
"As long as media is controlled in Iran, the blog on the 
destruction of Bam has given Iranian bloggers new impetus:
emotions about people's death," says the sociologist stoically.
Examples, he says, are "I can hear the voice of death, it's close 
and whispering in my ears";
"I don't know if I should be sad or angry,
I don't think the regime criminals care."
"Two bloggers even arranged to meet in Tehran," 
he says in amazement.

For now, the bloggers are allowed to blog
on and on,
undeterred.
20 billion years from now,
we will see where our freedom has gotten us.

The above poem is best viewed in desktop and landscape to keep the line breaks the way I intended.

Today’s poem from one of three sites that share a poem each day is “¿Que Que La Femme?” by Vincent Toro on the Academy of American Poets website, Poets.org.