March 7 1969: Apollo 9’s Lunar Module, Spider, sets out on its solo flight.

*****

A Spider’s song

As with multiple events in those days

fifty-five years ago, March 7, 1969,

it had never been tried before,

the fate and faith of the reborn Apollo 

riding aboard a delicate jewel

less than seven years in development

only making its second flight,

the first with astronauts aboard

a spacecraft with no heat shield,

with no ticket home

except to ride the orbital mechanics of rendezvous

back to the mother ship,

a bug-like craft originally called the Lunar Excursion Module (LEM)

later shortened to Lunar Module, still pronounced “Lem”

and for this flight named “Spider”

now in Earth orbit

on the fifth day 

of Apollo 9

and after four days of orbital checkout, 

engine firings in various configurations

and even a spacewalk

while attached to the Apollo command ship,

time to cut loose, fly free,

carry Jim McDivitt and Rusty Schweickart away

first out to fifty feet, pirouetting for inspection

by Dave Scott in the Command Module

who then backs away three miles for radar tests

before the LM fires its lunar Descent Engine 

setting out on a looping path to a distance of 111 miles

beyond sight of the mother ship,

a place where all time waits.

` After separating from the descent stage,

after a brief blip of the Ascent Engine

sends the crew stage looping back

after six hours of solo flight,

after fighting the sun’s glare off the command ship

during final approach, inching forward,

when the docking latches click, a buzzer announces we’re docked.

“I haven’t heard a song like that in a long time.”

*

A song that I believe was heard 

all the way to the airless moon.