decided i would   
settle down and just become
a sweet inspiration

in my younger years
before i learned
black people aren’t
suppose to dream
i wanted to be
a raelet
and say “dr o wn d in my youn tears”
or “tal kin bout tal kin bout”
or marjorie hendricks and grind   
all up against the mic
and scream
“baaaaaby nightandday   
baaaaaby nightandday”
then as i grew and matured
i became more sensible   
and decided i would   
settle down
and just become
a sweet inspiration

Dreams by Nikki Giovanni, from Black Feeling, Black Talk, Black Judgment, HarperCollins Publishers, New York, 1968

IN a convocation speech after a campus shooting at Virginia Tech where she was teaching, Ms. Giovanni said:

Nikki Giovanni said: “… We know we did nothing to deserve it. But neither does a child in Africa dying of AIDS. Neither do the invisible children walking the night awake to avoid being captured by a rogue army. Neither does the baby elephant watching his community being devastated for ivory. Neither does the Mexican child looking for fresh water …”

Of the speech, she would later say that she also sought to express the idea that really terrible things happen to good people: “I would call it, in terms of writing, in terms of poetry, it’s a laundry list. Because all you’re doing is: This is who we are, and this is what we think, and this is what we feel, and this is why – you know?… I just wanted to admit, you know, that we didn’t deserve this, and nobody does. And so I wanted to link our tragedy, in every sense, you know – we’re no different from anything else that has hurt….“

This is who we are, and this is what we think, and this is what we feel, and this is why.

I just wanted to admit, you know, that we didn’t deserve this, and nobody does.

Settle down and just become a sweet inspiration.

Famously she said once, “Sometimes you write a poem because damnit, you want to.”

Ms. Giovanni died Monday, December 9th, Twenty Twenty Four.

insufficient to
make a recognisable
explosion, hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

From the article, The most dangerous delivery truck? How a lorry-load of antimatter will help solve secrets of universe written by Robin McKie, science editor of The Observer.

McKie writes:

Antimatter is the most expensive material on Earth – it’s estimated it would cost several trillion dollars to make a gram – and it can only be manufactured in particle physics laboratories such as the Cern research centre near Geneva.

It is also extremely tricky to handle. If antimatter makes contact with normal matter, both are annihilated, releasing a powerful burst of electromagnetic radiation. Only by carefully combining sets of powerful electrical and magnetic fields in special devices can antimatter be stored safely.

“That makes moving it around very difficult, though we are now close to making our first journey,” said Prof Stefan Ulmer, a scientist at Cern. “Antimatter has so much to tell us. That is why we are doing this.”

The prospect of a similar blast happening in real life is remote, scientists insist – the quantities of antimatter carried will be insufficient to make an explosion of any recognisable nature.

Three things here to point out besides that last paragraph being a wonderful assemblage of words.

One, I did not know that in Europe recognisable is spelled with a S and not a Z so here in the states recognisable is tossed by spell check.

Two, the work in question is being done at European Organization for Nuclear Research which is known as CERN. I have never understood that. (along with the world soccer organization being known as FIFA).

Three, I would like a little more information on just what makes, “an explosion of any recognisable nature.“

When Enrico Fermi and the Manhattan Project folks set up the first self sustaining Atomic Reactor Pile, they were 99% sure it wouldn’t blow up and destroy all life within 100’s of miles if not the earth itself in an uncontrollable chain reaction gone uncontrollable.

They chose downtown Chicago for the test site.

Not until the Plutarkians came to strip mine Chicago in the 1990s did the city face such a possibility but the Plutarkians were defeated by the Biker Mice from Mars that lived in the scoreboard at Wrigley Field.

Still I feel my question is valid.

When dealing with antimatter … how big, how bad is an explosion of any recognisable nature?

Back in the day when I was in college there was an out break of measles and students who had never been vaccinated were advised to get a shot.

I thought about it and thought about it and thought, I had never been vacinated.

I called my Mom and she thought about it and thought about it and decided that in our family of 11 kids we had been exposed to measles but the last time someone had it, my brother Pete, she brought us all down to the Doctors who gave us Gamma Globulin short term protection shots and was told to get us all in for a vacine in about 6 months.

But with 11 kids, one thing happens after another and we never got back for our vaccine so Mom advised me to get the shot.

In line at the Student Health Clinic I was given a waver to sign

It said something along the lines of 1 out of 100,000 people MIGHT develop symptoms or have a reaction or get hit with Encephalitis.

In parenthesis the disclaimer read (A swelling of the brain).

Standing in line, I raised my head and yelled out, ‘Can I get anymore information about this SWELLING OF THE BRAIN?’

Everyone in lined ducked their heads down to look at the disclaimer.

The nurses all glared at me.

But I had an audience.

I then read off ALL the bad things that could happen and asked for more information as the line slowly move forward.

When I got to the nurse she leaned in and said to I wasn’t being very helpful as many of the people in line had a lot of anxiety about getting a shot, would I please SHUT UP.

I stood there.

Then I asked the nurse in a loud voice, “DID YOU EVER TALK TO ANYONE WHO DIED FROM A MEASLES SHOT?”

The nurse said LOUDLY, “OF COURSE NOT!”

And I said, “BECAUSE THEY WERE DEAD!”

And that nurse took that needle and jammed it straight into my arm.

She looked at me and grinned.

“You flinched,” she said.

All I want is a little more information on these explosions of an unrecognizable nature.