Planets cry too

There’s a poignant letter in today’s Sunday Age by a sensitive 7-year-old future-Byron, who is “sad and cross that Pluto isn’t a planet any more”.

Not only is young Rory Burg of Wheelers Hill a poet, but he’s also a budding polemicist. He argues cogently, “It doesn’t matter that Pluto is so small because Mercury is a small planet too, and the accretion field wouldn’t let Pluto into our galaxy unless it was a planet.”

Rory concludes: “The astronomers are just being bullies.” Hear, hear!

Finally, Rory delivers his valediction for Pluto:

Little Pluto
So small and sweet
Dancing with the comets
In a night that never ends.

Sad Pluto
Spinning, tilted orbit
Watching, hoping
For the sun to warm you.

Scared Pluto
But still so brave
Who knows what you can see
So close to other galaxies.

Cold Pluto
I love you so
When I am big
I’ll make you a planet again.

Angry Pluto
Teased and bullied
The comets cry
Wipe your eyes with stars
And tell Saturn to love you.

Sweet Pluto
As small as I am
But bigger inside
Dream of a new family,
Of shooting stars and comet

Beautiful Pluto
I will miss you …

So will we all. Hats off to Rory.