Connect
MJA
MJA

Coming of age

Stephen R Leeder
Med J Aust 2015; 202 (6): 341. || doi: 10.5694/mja15.00197
Published online: 6 April 2015

“You are old when you're born”, he* said.
So much living and dying
during those nine months:
clefts, gills and neural ridges
thrown up, filled in, torn down —
a time-lapse drama of evolution
played out on the foetal ocean floor.

Your cells by nine months
are wearied by wars
have forged truces with alien forces
built machines underwater
visited palaces drawn from fine tissue
played parts in evolutionary dramas
relaxed briefly on now sunken islands.

By birth your genes have had their day
your destiny set. I've heard
earnest clerics say we should
be born again. Terrible penance
surely to go through that once more.


*Stephen Simpson, academic director of the Charles Perkins Centre, University of Sydney
  • Stephen R Leeder

  • Medical Journal of Australia, Sydney, NSW.


Correspondence: sleeder@mja.com.au

Competing interests:

None declared

Author

remove_circle_outline Delete Author
add_circle_outline Add Author

Comment
Do you have any competing interests to declare? *

I/we agree to assign copyright to the Medical Journal of Australia and agree to the Conditions of publication *
I/we agree to the Terms of use of the Medical Journal of Australia *
Email me when people comment on this article

Online responses are no longer available. Please refer to our instructions for authors page for more information.