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NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day:

Some cloud patterns on Jupiter are quite complex. The featured tumultuous clouds were captured in May by NASA's robotic Juno spacecraft currently orbiting our Solar System's largest planet. The image was taken when Juno was only about 15,000 kilometers over Jupiter's cloud tops, so close that less than half of the giant planet is visible. The rough white clouds on the far right are high altitude clouds known as pop-up clouds. Juno's mission, now extended into 2021, is to study Jupiter in new ways. Among many other things, Juno has been measuring Jupiter's gravitational field, finding surprising evidence that Jupiter may be mostly a liquid.

An early bloomer
and more
is the lovely
Hellebore.

A string of words,
some dark as coal,
are coiled tightly
around my soul.
My question now
is so profound,
how do I manage
to write them down?

Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash

NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day:

On some nights, the sky is the best show in town. On this night, the sky was not only the best show in town, but a composite image of the sky won an international competition for landscape astrophotography. The featured winning image was taken in 2011 over Jökulsárlón, the largest glacial lake in Iceland. The photographer combined six exposures to capture not only two green auroral rings, but their reflections off the serene lake. Visible in the distant background sky is the band of our Milky Way Galaxy and the Andromeda galaxy. A powerful coronal mass ejection from the Sun caused auroras to be seen as far south as Wisconsin, USA. As the Sun progresses away from its current low in surface activity toward a solar maximum a few years away, many more spectacular images of aurora are expected.

Image Credit: Stephane Vetter (Nuits sacrees)

Photo by Tim Swaan on Unsplash

NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day:

Like salsa verde on your favorite burrito, a green aurora slathers up the sky in this 2017 June 25 snapshot from the International Space Station. About 400 kilometers (250 miles) above Earth, the orbiting station is itself within the upper realm of the auroral displays. Aurorae have the signature colors of excited molecules and atoms at the low densities found at extreme altitudes. Emission from atomic oxygen dominates this view. The tantalizing glow is green at lower altitudes, but rarer reddish bands extend above the space station's horizon. The orbital scene was captured while passing over a point south and east of Australia, with stars above the horizon at the right belonging to the constellation Canis Major, Orion's big dog. Sirius, alpha star of Canis Major, is the brightest star near the Earth's limb.

A box of words, stood alone,
high up on the shelf.
Words that had been used before
in another way or else,
some that were always hidden,
never being brought to light.
For they were forbidden words,
to be kept locked up tight.
Mean and cruel words, they were
causing heart ache, when
used in strings, almost everywhere.
What words are they, I hear now?
Blasphemous words, you say to me.
Well please explain how,
the words I love to write with Pen,
on a ruled, bound up book,
when I am writing now,
the last time I did look.

NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day:

Named for a forgotten constellation, the Quadrantid Meteor Shower is an annual event for planet Earth's northern hemisphere skygazers The shower's radiant on the sky lies within the old, astronomically obsolete constellation Quadrans Muralis. That location is not far from the Big Dipper, at the boundaries of the modern constellations Bootes and Draco. With the radiant out of the frame at the upper right, Quadrantid meteors streak through this night skyscape composed of digital frames recorded in the hours around the shower's peak on January 4, 2013. The last quarter moon illuminates rugged terrain and a section of the Great Wall in Hebei Province, China. A likely source of the dust stream that produces Quadrantid meteors was identified in 2003 as an asteroid. As usual, in 2020 the shower is expected to peak briefly on the night of January 3/4. Meteor fans in North America can anticpate a good show to celebrate the new year in moonless skies before tomorrow's dawn. Free Presentation: APOD Editor to show best astronomy images of 2019 -- and the decade -->tonight in NYC.

Photo by Cheng Luo

www.dannorrisphotography.com
http://dannorrisphoto.com

Photo by Mark Basarab on Unsplash

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I write for my readers
exactly like you.

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or comment a few,
I feel inspired to write
for those, just like you.