Clean Air Poem

UK researchers have come up with an interesting method to clean air. A poem has been printed on a material that can cleanse air. It has the ability to reduce the air pollution equivalent to pollution caused by 20 cars per day.

The material developed by the University of Sheffield, removes harmful nitrogen oxide and purifies the air.

The work has borne fruit out of a collaboration between Simon Armitage, Professor of Poetry at the University, and Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Science Professor Tony Ryan.

The poem title is, ‘In Praise of Air’.

The technology is not very expensive and can be effectively utilised for billboards and advertisements. The material has a coating of titanium dioxide which has the ability to utilise sunlight and oxygen to react with nitrogen oxide pollutants.

The poem will be on display at the University’s Alfred Denny Building, Western Bank, for an year.

Below is the entire text of the poem-

In praise of Air by Simon Armitage

“I write in praise of air. I was six or five

when a conjurer opened my knotted fist

and I held in my palm the whole of the sky.

I’ve carried it with me ever since.

Let air be a major god, its being

and touch, its breast-milk always tilted

to the lips. Both dragonfly and Boeing

dangle in its see-through nothingness…

Among the jumbled bric-a-brac I keep

a padlocked treasure-chest of empty space

and on days when thoughts are fuddled with smog

or civilization crosses the street

with a white handkerchief over its mouth

and cars blow kisses to our lips from theirs

I turn the key, throw back the lid, breathe deep.

My first word, everyone’s first word, was air.”