Strange Charm

A quark is a fundamental constituent of matter

Observed in 1968 through deep elastic scatter

We found that protons aren't as simple as we thought

We thought they were solid particles, but they are not

Protons, in fact, are made up of three separate pieces

It just gets more confusing as our knowledge increases

But that is what a quark is, it's a piece of a proton

And they also make up other things, including the neutron

Oh, up, down, strange charm, top, bottom

If you don't know what a quark is, it don't matter, you still got'em

And with leptons and bosons, unless somethings amiss

They make up everything that we can see and that we know exists

Things made up of quarks, including protons and neutrons

Are composite particles that physicists call hadrons

Many types of hadrons are theoretically described

But most exist for only brief amounts of time

Quarks have electric charge, color charge, mass and spin

And having color charge means they exists soully in

Inside of other particles and cannot exist alone

Which why quarks have never been studied on their own

Up, down, strange charm, top, bottom

If you don't know what a quark is, it don't matter, you still got'em

And with leptons and bosons, unless somethings amiss

They make up everything that we can see and that we know exists

Quarks can join together in two different ways

Baryons and mesons, but most instantly decay

If a particle has three quarks, then it's a baryon

And if there's one quark and an anti-quark, then it is a meson

These tiny bits of matter are a part of almost everything

And there is no unified theory to make it less confusing

But the fact that we've identified that they exist at all

Is so God damn remarkable that I just sit in awe

Oh, up, down, strange charm, top, bottom

If you don't know what a quark is, it don't matter, you still got'em

And with leptons and bosons, unless somethings amiss

They make up everything that we can see and that we know exists