'Cross the Mississippi river, there's a planet we all knew,
That we read about in textbooks back when we were twenty-two,
When that planet was a planet, the entire planet through,
But now Pluto's just a planet — in Illinois.
Well, the year was twenty-aught-six when the astronomical union,
Said, "That's too many large objects, with their orbits trans-Neptunian,
And if we call them all planets, how does 'planet' outrank 'moon' again?"
So they made Pluto not a Planet — (and made us) Ill and Annoyed.
'Til Senator Gary G. Dahl of injustice had his fill,
So he wrote a resolution, and they voted through the bill,
saying, "That which was a planet, let it be a planet still,
And let Pluto be a planet — in Illinois."
So let us all rejoice together with the underworld's dark lord,
Whose domain became demoted while the housing bubble soared.
What the IAU has taken the state senate has restored,
And may Pluto be a planet — in Illinois, forevermore.
