LIFE ON ENCELADUS
It’s snowing all the time at the south pole of Enceladus
Which is a moon of Saturn
With the loveliest name
And the brightest object in the solar system
Reflecting 98% sunlight
Its surface like the best powder day
So cold no life could multiply
Except the orbit of Enceladus
Around Saturn is elliptical
And squeezes the moon’s interior
To liquid and also what’s frozen
Underneath the white mantle
So now and then a geyser of salt
Water sprays upward and perhaps
Growing in the water a litter of microbes
As yet undiscovered but possible
Its alien DNA unsullied because capped
Beneath ice and acres of snow deeper
Than Everest is high Enceladus
Like the white canvas of eternity
Stroked by a brush with a single hair
