From Arsenic to Zirconium

LEAD, Pb

THE ROMAN PLUMBER’S MATE

You’re stable, soft and work’d with ease—the Roman plumber’s mate,

Van Gogh applied your salts in paint; fair skin you’ve help’d create.

For years you quelled that knocking sound,

In cars, where still your cells abound.

Alas, you harm our neurons, blood, and means to procreate.

You’re stable, soft and work’d with ease—the Roman plumber’s mate,

GROUP 14 METAL

For centuries the heavy, soft, eminently workable, and dullish-gray element lead was the plumber’s material of choice for fabricating water pipes and drains. In fact, the element is so stable that certain lead drainpipes installed in ancient Rome still ...