In coming to know the Human Genome

‘Before the discovery of the Genome, we did not know there was a document at the heart of every cell three billion letters long of whose content we knew nothing – now, having read parts of that book we are aware of myriad new mysteries.’ Matt Ridley, Genome: The Autobiography of a Species in 23 Chapters, Fourth Estate, 2000


In coming to know the Human Genome

In coming to know the Human Genome,
we move nearer to understanding God -

not further away, as science has wrongly
driven us to conclude hitherto; far nearer

to hearing, reading, knowing the Word -
understanding the organic/spirit concept.

Science has turned the Victorian corner -
elaborating the white formula, Latin map,

it took for the nature, entire, of skeleton
and bone; red corpuscles, valve, muscle,

pumping blood mechanism, mistaken
for the whole heart solved, understood -

recognising now, under unromantic laboratory
striplights, this cold, synthetic gleam it mistook

for its own neutered soul, narrowness miscalculated
as clarity of vision - meanness of its slice scalpelled

from reality, analysed - alienated from context.
Always knowing somewhere this rigid, absolute

model did not fit these imprecise edges of reality -
where the utterly exact, knowable, comprehensible,

immutable, measureable, bleeds in and out
everywhere; is connected to everything else.

Was God Surprised by Us

Was God Surprised by Us

Was God surprised by us -
still; our hands, eyes, love,

even if He had dreamed
of the Word’s flowering;

of all possible blooms
in His evolving garden.

Was He pleased when we kneeled,
embarrassed, because He believes

in Freedom, Pride, Will - suffering
such unlikely price, gathering woe,

of no direct interference, witnessed
in this premature, burning autumn

of the garden - cultivated Winter
of Creation cultured by mankind.

Reluctantly leaving only amputated
power - dangling spiritual umbilical

cord, invisible,
up to Heaven.

Animal of the Universe

Animal of the Universe

Tonight a sky of stars is speaking light -
there is something I nearly understand,

coming from original dust, space-home;
as animal of the Universe. Some music

of colossal dancing, also under my skin,
as moving the tree’s ballet dancer arms.

But I can’t quite remember - make out
what they’re saying, singing; not quite.