Spectator Competition: Space to think

Competition 3370 invited poems about the predicament of the Nasa astronauts stranded on the ISS – thanks to Paul Freeman for this suggestion. There was a wide range of ideas about how they could use their time, from self–improvement to… other things. Due to a different space issue, many good entries had to be jettisoned, but those below win £25.

Five miles a second, travelling at speed,
Recycling the water we’ve formerly weed,
Dusk follows dawn every hour and thirty,
There’s too much to do to be shouty or shirty –

We came for a week, but our taxi was iffy;
No need to be uppity, none to be sniffy –
The wires need testing, experiments checked,
Back in the spring, so we hope and expect –

We eat what we like when we raid the reserves;
We’ve no time to get on our crew members’ nerves –
The Middle East rages, the Russians throw wobblers;
Up here we say that all conflict is cobblers –

The camera’s off now.