{"id":2660,"date":"2008-03-04T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2008-03-03T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sunpig.com\/abi\/?p=2660"},"modified":"2014-01-19T23:03:14","modified_gmt":"2014-01-19T22:03:14","slug":"we-nine-clades-of-trilobites-are","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/abi\/2008\/03\/04\/we-nine-clades-of-trilobites-are\/","title":{"rendered":"We nine clades of trilobites are"},"content":{"rendered":"

Teresa Nielsen Hayden pointed me (and the rest of the net) to a page<\/a> on the nine orders of trilobites. It’s a great page, and leads to some good clicktrance.\u00a0 But it made me think of “We Three Kings of Orient Are”.\u00a0 And once I’d thought of it, of course, I had to write it.\u00a0 (Sleep being, of course, something that happens to Other People)<\/p>\n

Trilobites from Cambrian stone
\nEvolution glorious shown:
\nAdaptations, variations
\nOn their ancestors unknown.<\/p>\n

O fossil record, long preserved
\nAncient hist’ry still conserved
\nStone from sand made, nine of their clade
\nNow are classed from forms observed.<\/i><\/p>\n

Ancient Agnostida you find
\nPrimitive, and many are blind
\nHead like butt, thus isopygous
\n(Greek is much less unkind!)<\/p>\n

Redlichiida’s thoracic spines
\nForm distinctive parallel lines
\nMicropygus, eyes a big plus.
\nOrder that the head defines.<\/p>\n

Varied trilobites could conform
\nTo Ptychopariidanic form.
\nLong surviving, widely thriving
\nGiving them time to transform.<\/p>\n

Corynexochida descends
\nAnd from Redlichiida’s form bends:
\nGlabella clavate, bum a tad great
\nPointiest at their back ends.<\/p>\n

Many trilobites spread their spines
\nFew, however managed the lines
\nOf Lichida, lacy leader:
\nOrder that’s dressed to the nines.<\/p>\n

Asaphids, effac\u00e9d, could glide
\nOr perhaps in sediment hide.
\nDistinctive sutures but no futures
\nThe order still, like others, died.<\/p>\n

Lasting till the Permian age
\nProetida, ultimate stage.
\nSmall, with spineless tail behind, this
\nOrder turned the final page.<\/p>\n

Semi-circle or ovate brimmed
\nRostral plate by ages’ change trimmed.
\nPtychopariida had Harpetida
\nBut was by an order slimmed.<\/p>\n

Spineless trilobites, a surprise!
\nWhat that in prehistory lies
\nCould but see the Phacopida
\nAs they saw with compound eyes.<\/p>\n

Worlds change, adapt if you can.
\nAs with trilobites so with man?
\nGlobal warming, new plagues forming
\nMay we run as long as they ran.<\/p>\n

O fossil record, long preserve
\nAll our hist’ry, and conserve
\nStone from sand made, what of our clade
\nWill be known, and who’ll observe?<\/i><\/p>\n

The scansion gets a bit ragged on the last lines; I was kinda punchy by the time I finished it.\u00a0 But it was fun; how many times do you get to rhyme “Head like butt, thus” with “isopygous” in one lifetime, after all?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Teresa Nielsen Hayden pointed me (and the rest of the net) to a page on the nine orders of trilobites. It’s a great page, and leads to some good clicktrance.\u00a0 But it made me think of “We Three Kings of Orient Are”.\u00a0 And once I’d thought of it, of course, I had to write it.\u00a0 … Continue reading We nine clades of trilobites are<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1589],"tags":[1790,1818,1819],"class_list":["post-2660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-doggerel-pastiches","tag-lyrics","tag-trilobites","tag-we-three-kings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/abi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/abi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/abi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/abi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/abi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2660"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/abi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2660\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2663,"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/abi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2660\/revisions\/2663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/abi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/abi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/abi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}