By Bruce Smith
Lately, I’ve been reading a good bit about biological wonders and a variety of remarkable scientific discoveries. Having gone very lightly on science after high school, these have been a mind-expanding experience. Some facts stretch the imagination to comprehend the entwined vitality, unsuspected intelligences and incredible adaptations found in our natural world. Even mosses and lichens have remarkable stories to tell!
Last night I came across this poem and thought it caught a sense of the wonder and miraculous nature that exists all around us. If we take the time to appreciate, perhaps we can join Walt Whitman in his sense of awe and appreciation. Hope you enjoy it!
As to me, I know of nothing else but miracles,
Whether … I stand under trees in the woods
Or watch honey bees busy around the hive …
Or animals feeding in the fields …
Or birds, or the wonderfulness of insects in the air …
Or the wonderfulness of sun-down --- or the stars shining
so quiet and bright
Or the exquisite, delicate, think curve of the new-moon in May,
Or whether I go among those I like best, and that like me best –
Mechanics, boatmen, farmers
Or among the savans or – to the soiree – or to the opera,
Or stand a long while looking at the movements of machinery,
Or behold children in their sports,
Or the admirable sight of the perfect old man, or the perfect old
Woman.
Or the sick in hospitals, or the dead carried to burial,
Or my own eyes and figure in the glass,
These, with the rest, one and all, are to me miracles,
The whole referring – yet each distinct and in its place
To me, every hour of the light and dark is a miracle,
Every inch of space is a miracle,
Every square yard of the surface of the earth is spread with the same,
Every cubic foot of the interior swarms with the same;
Every spear of grass – the frames, limbs, organs, of men and women
And all that concerns them,
All these to me are unspeakable miracles.
Walt Whitman 1855
And can you imagine what Whitman would make of discoveries we’ve since made in trees, fields, insects, space, machinery, and human biology since 1855!! More miracles than he even imagined!!