periodic table poem

“Palladium” poem by Janet Kuypers

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Palladium

Janet Kuypers

from the “ Periodic Table of Poetry” series

“Have you ever been to the Palladium?”
He asked me,
so I asked, “The one in New York?”
“No…”
“Oh, the Hollywood Palladium? No.”
But the thing is, after the success
of the Hollywood Palladium,
New York converted the Academy of Music
to the Palladium in ‘76,
there are Palladium theaters in San Antonio TX.,
St. Petersburg FL, Detroit MI,
High Point NC, even Worcester, MA.
Sorry I haven’t been.
I was actually thinking
about how as an element
Palladium is a rare and lustrous silvery-white metal
(like other other platinum group metals),
and although it is primarily used now
in catalytic converters, which convert
up to 90% of harmful gases from auto exhaust.
Palladium is also used to make
fine-art black-and-white prints,
and Palladium even plays a key role in technology
used for fuel cells, combining hydrogen and oxygen
to produce electricity, heat, and water.
And the thing is, Palladium has been used
for jewelry as a replacement for platinum…

You know, I think it would sound kind of cool
to say you have a diamond set
in a Palladium band
instead of a platinum one.

I mean, it would then have one more thing
to make it worth talking about….

Then he asked me,
“Would you rather have a Palladium diamond ring
or perform at the Hollywood Palladium?
And I thought about it for a second,
then answered,
“I’d rather perform at the Palladium.
The ring is just a thing
I could get at any time.”

Then I saw the news,
stating that platinum was about
to skyrocket in price,
and I thought,
“wait a minute,
now might be a good time
to get that Palladium jewelry,
before the price of Palladium
goes up too…”

Einsteinium poem by Janet Kuypers

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Einsteinium

Janet Kuypers

from the “ Periodic Table of Poetry” series

Einstein understood
that everything was relative…

Why did he have to worry
about brushing his hair
or changing out of his pajamas
when he was busy grappling
with the foundations of phyics?

And once he fathomed
the relationship
between matter and energy,
once he understood
the interconnectivity
between matter and energy —

he suddenly understood,
after this Jewish physicist
left his home in Germany,
that Hitler and the Third Reich
could be working on an atomic bomb,
converting so little matter
into so much devastating energy.

At this time, he understood
the need for Roosevelt
to create this weapon
so the Germans wouldn’t destroy us.

The gravity of this discovery
in the hands of evil men
weighed him down,
and even months
before he died,
Einstein wrote
that although the devastation
in Hiroshima and Nagasaki
seemed unfathomably horrific
and he regretted writing
that letter to Roosevelt,
his justification
was the threat of Germany.
When he wrote that letter,
he still had to appeal to Roosevelt,
that yes, to save us from Germany,
this weapon needed to be created.

Knowing about his torment
in making this decision
to ask for the creation
of the atomic bomb,
makes it so ironically beautiful
that after scientists
discovered an element
after the first explosion
of the hydrogen bomb,
they named the element Einsteinium
after the physicist.

How
ironically
beautiful.

Einsteinium is a silvery-white,
radioactive, synthetic element
with a high fission rate,
like the atomic bombs
Einstein first knew of
when fearing his homeland enemy.
But because of the short half-life
of all isotopes of Einsteinium,
all primordial Einsteinium
has decayed by now,
and beyond it’s nuclear creation,
there is almost no use
for any isotope of Einsteinium
outside of basic scientific research…

Which makes me think of the
life of Albert Einstein, I suppose,
for although Einstein worked
at odd jobs for years
until he was a patent examiner,
his mind was only good at one thing:
doing not-so-basic scientific research,
solving scientific fundamental puzzles,
if only he had the time
to study the puzzle long enough.

photos of Janet Kuypers and Albert Einstein with their tongues sticking out

Americium poem by Janet Kuypers

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Americium

Janet Kuypers

from the “ Periodic Table of Poetry” series

When I heard there was an element
called Americium,
I thought,
what scientist felt possessed
to name an element
after the United States of America?
I mean,
was it discovered during a war effort
when everyone rallied with national spirit?
Was it a World War Two effort
against the element Germanium
named after Germania
(even though that element was not named
for Hitler’s desire to create
the perfect thousand year empire)?
I can’t believe the decision
to name an element Americium
was based on the boo-rah mentality,
go fight win, U.S.A., U.S.A….
I mean, is the actual element
somehow explicitly related to America?

Okay, fine, I will look on line for information.
Let me first check dictionary dot com
before Google or Wikipedia
for information about Americium…
But before I scrolled down to the definition
I saw the speaker icon,
so I could hear the computer-generated voice
say Americium for me…
Oh, Ah-mer-EE-cee-um.
Not Uh-MARE-ick-ee-um. Oops.
But the definition says Americium
is the products of high-energy helium bombardment
of uranium and plutonium.
Wow. I’m really going to have to research this,
and maybe I can dispel the World War Two links
I was apparently making up for this element.

Wait a minute, Americium was discovered
in 1944, but the discovery was kept secret
and only released to the public in November 1945.
(Okay, this doesn’t help my anti-Hitler case…)
Let’s see… Americium was first identified
at the University of California, Berkeley,
and it was chemically identified in Argonne Lab
at the University of Chicago. Okay,
so it was discovered in America, but
in the Periodic Table, Americium falls
right next to it’s twin lanthanide element europium;
so thus by analogy, they named this element
after another continent, America.

Hmmm, fun little story. But Americium
was primarily used in nuclear tests
conducted between 1945 and 1980,
as well as at sites like the Chernobyl disaster.
(Oh, so we go from Germany as our emeny
to the Soviet Union as our enemy,
because the enemy of your enemy
is not necessarily your friend.)
And elevated levels of Americium
were also at the crash site of a US B-52 bomber
which carried four hydrogen bombs
in 1968 in Greenland.

But us Americans have to come up
with more practical appplications
for Americium than nuclear testing…
And that’s when I learnbed
that the silvery-white element
(which is soft and malleable,
and tarnishes in the air)
has isotopes that are used in
smoke detectors.
So an element that can help kill
can also help save people’s lives.
Well, I guess in a way
that sounds like America, too.

Platinum poem by Janet Kuypers

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Platinum

Janet Kuypers

from the “ Periodic Table of Poetry” series

A secretary for a trading company
at the Chicago Board of Trade
started dating a trader
(even though he was a trader,
he seemed like a nice guy) —
and after he asked her to marry him
and they were engaged,
she cheating on him
by having an affair with a coworker.
They broke off their engagement
until he forgave her
and offered her an engagement ring
with a huge solitary diamond
in a thick Platinum setting.
Looking like white gold,
Platinum was more expensive,
so she was pleased
she got him to spend
more money on her.

Well, they married,
but within a few years
they were divorced.

It’s a shame that marriage
couldn’t last as long
as that Platinum engagement ring,
made out of one of the strongest
metal elements in the Periodic Table.

I wonder what they did with that ring.
I hope they returned it,
so a stronger couple
could better accentuate
that stronger Platinum ring
and be a better match for all time.

Because I know the Platinum Metal Group
elements are really strong and durable,
because Platinum’s been used in everything
from razor edges to prevent corrosion
to spark plugs, so they can be hotter
and have a longer life.

So yeah, because of Platinum’s
resistance to heat,
it makes sense that Platinum is used
in catalytic converters in cars too —
temporarily pulling the nitrogen
and carbon atoms from
nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide
until they can re-bond
into water and less dangerous byproducts
for the environment.

Because Platinum can really stand the heat,
Platinum’s used for temperature detectors
and high-accuracy electronic thermometers,
and some parts that are launched into space
have been made out of Platinum
because they could not only
withstand the temperatures,
but also prevent corrosion,
so everything being blasted off into space
could stand everything
the Universe may throw at them.

So with Platinum being so resistant to corrosion,
it makes sense that Platinum parts
are in computers, and even in parts
for neurosurgery… I’ve even heard
(though I don’t know the details)
that Platinum may be used
in cancer medication too.
(Wow, that would be great to hear,
if Platinum could also possibly
help people with cancer…)

But when I mentioned Platinum
to someone recently,
the only thing they thought
it was for was
“wealth accumulation”.
And I thought, “For what?
Like buying gold bars?”
Because even though I see
“Cash for Gold” ads,
I haven’t seen people or places
making “Cash for Platinum” calls,
but wealth accumulation must be right,
it has a higher value than gold,
and as we’ve discovered,
it could also be strobng enough
for a wedding band
to truly withstand
the test of time.

Osmium poem by Janet Kuypers

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Osmium

Janet Kuypers

from the “ Periodic Table of Poetry” series

Hearing the word “Osmium” recently
(and not knowing what the word means),
the only thing that popped into my head
was the Osmonds,
Then I had this crazy 1970s flashback
to watching the Donny and Marie Osmond show,
her singing “I’m a Little Bit Country”
and him singing “I’m a Little Bit Rock ‘n Roll”
(and listening to that ‘70s song now,
you’d swear that Donny Osmond
has no Motown in his soul)…
But when I was little, I even had
the Donny and Marie Barbie-styled
dolls and play set, which even had
a stage where they could sing —
they had microphones — and this
is the best part — the Donny and Marie
dolls had holes through their hands
(if only these holes leaked blood, so the
Donny and Marie stigmata was complete)
so microphones could lock into their hands.

I guess Donny and Marie dolls
had the stigmata so they could
have that strong bond
with the microphone,
like their strong Osmond
family bond.

Because I’m sure
a family bond
is harder than anything.

And no, I didn’t know what “Osmium” was,
but Osmium is a blue-gray
to blue-black transition metal,
and as far as elements go,
it’s actually the densest
hard transition metal
in the platinum family,
that actually remains lustrous,
even at higher temperatures.

And you know,
I’ve got a medical bracelet
I have to wear all the time…
If my medical bracelet
was made out of Osmium
it would probably last forever
and look really cool too…

But then again,
because it’s so dense and so hard,
it’s probably too brittle
to shape into a bracelet.
But I’m sure they use Osmium
in applications where durability
and hardness are needed,
like in the constant varying pressure
in fountain pen nibs,
or very repetitive and exacting
electrical contacts.

And the other thing that’s a bummer
about the densest element
in the Periodic Table
is that Osmium is actually
the least abundant element
in the earth’s crust…
So I guess it makes sense
that since it’s only obtained
during copper and nickel mining,
it would probably be used
for such small objects
like fountain pen nibs
and electrical circuitry
when these minute things
need to last.

And yeah, the thing is,
Osmium can also be used
for fingerprint detection,
and it can even stain fatty tissue
for optical and electron microscopy.
So it’s excellent-cool
that Osmium can also be used
on a microscopic level like that
to help us out so much too…

So, maybe if something
as dense and hard as Osmium
is actually quite rare here,
it’s a good thing
we’ve learned to utilize
such small amounts
of this dense element
for so many things
to help us out so much in life.