Thirty-three engines rumbling
thrust building, years of
research and development
on the line, wild hopes of
Martian settlement, eternal
fame and glory, first steps
taken on an amazing path.
Starship lifting, blazing in
power, glory, rising above
little Boca Chica, above
town and coast and nation.
Just four minutes in,
twenty-four miles above the
Texas coast, in a spinning,
looping sky dance, Starship
blew apart, disintegrated into
uncountable pieces dropping
from the early morning sky in
rapid unscheduled disassembly,
R. U. D. – once simply known
as an explosion, a failure, now
called success, a necessary step
on the long journey into space,
into our solar system and beyond.
About the Poem
Concerns the recent launch and explosion of SpaceX’s Starship rocket.
About the Author
J. B. Hogan has published over 300 stories and poems and eleven books, including
Bar Harbor, Bounty Riders, Time and Time Again, Mexican Skies, Tin Hollow, Living Behind Time, Losing Cotton, The Rubicon, Fallen, The Apostate, and Angels in the Ozarks (nonfiction, local professional baseball history). He lives in Fayetteville, Arkansas.