Sitting in my cubicle, grey-walled and barren,
I stare at my hands
and suddenly see stars.

I stare at my legs: more stars;
My abdomen is a roiling galaxy.
With a soundless flash
my heart reveals a supernova.

No mere metaphor am I,
Rather, I am star-stuff.
Ancient, elemental, cloaked in existential mystery,
Ringing with the music of the spheres,
Sympathetic vibrations of the Biggest Bang.

My atoms, birthed in stellar echoes,
Descend across Space and Time
To this very Here and Now.

***

Sitting in my cubicle, grey and sterile,
I stare at my hands
and hear ancestral voices.

How can it be
That I never heard them before now?
They are so near,
Speaking from my very DNA.

My DNA, coiled tighter than a blind watchmaker’s spring.
Unwound, would stretch across the solar system
From one side of Pluto’s icy orbit to the other,
With enough reach left to come back home.

My DNA, the gift of all my ancestors.
Each molecule with its legacy of life,
From my mother and father back,
And back and back and back,
Until at last I can see my roots
Sunk deep into primordial ooze.

***

Alone in my cubicle, eyes closed,
I stare inward at myself
And see the miracle:
All of life,
All of space,
All of time,
Wrapped in this skin,
Sitting in this chair.

As supernovae flash and my ancestors sing,
I don’t feel all that barren any more.

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