This is a fun poem from a few years ago. A copy of the poem hangs in my dad's lab. Enjoy!
A Circuit of Electricity:
by
Michael Curzan
The battery is the essential part:
Where a circuit can end and start.
Then an electric conductor or wire
Carries the current away from the source,
And through all the parts of the entire
Circuit runs this electric force.
Two common circuit components are:
The lightbulb, shining like a star,
Converting electrical energy into
Radiant energy; and the spinning
Electric motor, moving through
A full turn back to the turn’s beginning,
Which from electricity does create
Mechanical energy at a fast rate.
If you have a switch and you can work it,
You can turn on and off a circuit.
A switch, by moving a wire inside,
Can change the state of the circuit from
Open to closed. Where a switch does reside
Affects what part of the circuit will become
Altered by the switch when it moves.
The on-off state is what a switch improves.
When there is just one motor or light,
There’s only one way to power it right
In a circuit with just one battery.
But if there are two lights or any more,
There are multiple possible circuits, you see.
These types of circuits are fun to explore.
In series, the circuit wires never split,
And the total resistance dims the light;
In parallel, the circuit branches, and it
Is possible to have all the lights be bright.
The final thing I’d like to say
Is watch out for short circuits every day.
When the current has a chance to flow
Straight from one battery terminal to
The other, that’s where it will go,
And a short circuit forms, its true.
Short circuit are dangerous without a doubt
Because they heat up and can cause fires.
They also wear the battery out
With so little resistance on the wires.
