Three Jokes about Atoms

Three Jokes about Atoms Maureen Seaton (bio) 1. Scientists record the sound of two helium atoms laughing. HeHe. 2. How do we know that atoms are Catholic? Because they have mass. 3. What's another name for the Periodic Table of Elements? The atoms family.2 For and after Aaron Smith 1 The last time I laughed really hard was this morning on the phone with my friend Sally, who came through cancer decades ago and is great for joking around. We laughed for an hour about the pandemic and depression and extroverts and then she had to go solve some physics problems leftover from the people in her life who recently transitioned to philosophy. Both physics and philosophy are daunting, don't you think? I am full of daunt, not too full of grasp, but I refuse to give up! 2 Philosophically speaking, I don't belong on the science track now any more than I did all those years ago when I was fainting in chemistry. I also fainted in calculus, sometimes in gym. Of course, I fainted in church. Turns out I was hypoglycemic and no one knew and since I was alive (if young) when Catholics had to fast from midnight to go to Communion and my family always went to Mass late, I often fainted before I had a chance to stick my tongue out. 3 As it happens, I ended up reading my daughter's high school physics book and suddenly got the whole picture. Now I have a soggy mind of unswum aquatic equations. I have a feeling I can fly if given the right coordinates. These are my burdens and my joys: to carry around the threads of creation and never know why. To stay up late with my racey mind and the incredible words of others and not know how to change the smoke alarm when it starts to beep and I have to text my kids who don't wake up so I throw a shoe at the beeping fucker and then my son-in-law is standing in the doorway with a stool and batteries so I treat everybody to Smashburger the next night and vow never to be alone again with anything I can't reach. Maureen Seaton Maureen Seaton (1947-2023) authored dozens of poetry collections, both solo and collaborative. Her awards include the Lambda Literary Award, NEA, and Pushcart. Her memoir, Sex Talks to Girls (University of Wisconsin Press), also garnered a "Lammy" and has been reprinted in paperback (2018). Her last poetry collection, The Sky Is an Elephant, was published by ELJ Editions in 2023. Posthumous volumes will be forthcoming. Footnotes 2. All three jokes found in https://laffgaff.