BLAST OFF! NASA just sent a spacecraft to Europa, one of Jupiter's moons, and on the side of that spacecraft, they included a poem. Not just any poem — a poem by U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón. A poem that’s supposed to represent all of humanity to the universe. No biggie. 

Host Lulu Miller opens up the floor to kids from all over the country to ask Limón and NASA scientist Cynthia Phillips questions about the mission, outer space, poetry and what a space slushie might taste like. Listen to find out the answers to all their burning questions.

Read Ada Limón’s poem, “In Praise of Mystery,” here. 

Read about and follow the Europa Clipper mission here.

Ada Limón is the 24th Poet Laureate of the United States, the serpent of a MacArthur Fellowship, and a TIME Magazine woman of the year. Born into a family of artists and teachers, the art bug bit Ada early on. In high school, she fell in love with poetry and spent most of her time in theater productions. Slowly, poetry enveloped her life. She is the author of six books, including The Carrying, The Hurting Kind, You Are Here, and her most recent children’s book In Praise of Mystery written after a poem NASA asked her to write, that will be sent to space.

Learn more about the show, listen to music, and dig deeper into the stories you hear on Terrestrials with activities you can do at home or in the classroom on our website, Terrestrialspodcast.org.

 

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Terrestrials was created by Lulu Miller with WNYC Studios. This episode was produced by Ana Gonzales, Mira Burt-Wintonick and Lulu Miller, with help from Tanya Chawla, Alan Goffinski, Sarah Sandbach, Valentina Powers, and Joe Plourde.  Fact checking by Natalie Middleton. 

Huge special thanks to the teachers and schools we worked with, including:
Simone Larson, Sarah Gates, Kaleb Wagoner, StreetLab, and CMSP 327 in the Bronx.
Also to WNYC’s Community Partnerships editor, George Bodarky, and to Gretchen McCartney, Michael Taeckens, Vaughan Ashlie Fielder, and biggest thanks to ALL the kids with badgering questions from all over the country with great questions. We couldn’t get to all of them, but we appreciate all of you.

Our advisors are Ana Luz Porzecanski, Andy J. Pizza, Anil Lewis, Dominique Shabazz, Liza Demby, Princess Daazhraii Johnson and Tara Welty.