Projection, Much?

I want to live where this guy lives.

(I saved a screen shot, in case the site corrects the misspellings.)

Every house without a steeple, every hill without a cross
Every airplane, every car, and every boat
Every lack of iconography just leaves me at a loss
As the godless shove their world-view down my throat.

There’s a steeple at St. Mary’s and the church just down the block;
From the hill, there’s twenty crosses you can note
But the larger space between them leaves me shuddering in shock
As the godless shove their world-view down my throat.

They won’t let me keep the banner
They won’t let me lead school prayer
They won’t let me build a crèche at City Hall
They won’t let me say that marriage
Doesn’t mean a same-sex pair
They won’t let me do most anything at all!

Though there’s god upon my money, and there’s god inside the pledge
Which the little kids recite each day by rote
In their art, or math, or science class, an atheistic wedge
As the godless shove their world-view down my throat

For the record, what he’s feeling is the tiniest reeling in of massive Christian Privilege.

The Evolutionary Biology Valentine

This one made it to The Open Laboratory one year, but has yet to show up in a Hallmark card.

In sociobiology,
Why I love you and you love me—
Which anyone can plainly see—
Is mostly in our genes.
No, not the ones you buy in stores,
But what a scientist explores–
I like the way you look in yours,
And you know what that means.

What subtly-coded stimulus
Takes you and me, and makes us “us”
And makes us feel ‘twas ever thus?
The list of suspects narrows.
No longer are we all a-shiver
From some Cupid with a quiver
Out of which he might deliver
Fusillades of Eros.

Nor Dopamine, nor Serotonin
Tell us why our hearts are moanin’
Though they serve to help us hone in
On–not why, but how;
The parasympathetic blush,
Adrenaline to bring a rush,
Are how, not why, I’ve got a crush
On you, my darling, now.

But if old Charles Darwin’s right,
The reason that the merest sight
Of you will always give delight
Is…reproductive fitness.
Throughout our species’ family tree,
Producing proper progeny
Is what determined you and me
And Darwin was the witness.

Is thinking that you’re oh so sweet
And how you’ll make my life complete
Some trick to make our gametes meet?
It seems it may be so.
I feel the way I feel today
Because some bit of DNA
Sees your genetics on display
And wants to say “hello.”

But think of this, for what it’s worth:
Millennia before my birth
That DNA had roamed the earth,
In residents thereof;
The neat thing is, it’s really true,
The feeling that I have for you
Although, of course, it feels brand-new
Is truly ageless love.

Science Of Love (A Valentine)

It’s February, and I’m already getting searches for various sorts of scientific valentines. So as a public service, I’m gonna be re-posting several of my favorites from previous years. These are not anti-love or anti-science, but you could call them anti-reductionist. Love is not something that chemicals do, it’s something that we do.

When science examines romantic attraction
(In other words, love and affection)
It uses the methods that serve us so well
But hearts can’t survive a dissection.

We study, in science, by breaking up problems
And looking at pieces and bits
Assemble the puzzle to show the big picture—
Assuming each smaller piece fits!

In life, we see love as a powerful feeling
It’s typically shared (say, by two);
You wouldn’t find love by examining neurons
But that’s something science might do.

A chemical cocktail assaulting the cortex,
Anandamide flooding the brain
Endogenous opiates running amok
And you’re either in love, or insane

Neurochemistry surely is crucial, I know,
But something important is missing
I’ve never encountered a brain, on its own,
With an interest in hugging or kissing.

Your genes play a part, I’m reliably told
By geneticists (likely, they’d know)
Though environment, epigenetically, molds
How those characteristics might show.

My heartbeat will race at the thought of your face
And my stomach gets tied in a knot
My fingers may tremble; my brow may perspire,
And other parts start feeling hot.

But none of these pieces can claim to be love
They’re mere tiles, in a larger mosaic
This modern view separates love into pieces;
My view is a bit more archaic

When I tell you I love you, you know what I mean:
Not only with all of my heart
Not only my brain, as complex as it is,
But all of me—every last part.

Just Who Is At Fault Here?

Do you know how much it cost
When I fought the law and lost?
When the judge reviewed and tossed out my opinion?
I’ll admit it gave me pause
When he said I broke the laws
Though I disagree, because it’s God’s dominion!

Though I lost my legal claim
I’ll hold Jessica to blame
She’s a child, but she’s fair game for the decision
She’s the reason that we must
Pay the lawyers or go bust
So that’s why her name’s discussed with such derision

Yes, the truth is, it’s our fault;
We’re the ones on the assault
We’d pay nothing, had we halted our transgression
But we had to roll the dice
So we get to pay the price
Maybe next time, we’ll think twice about oppression

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