We're dabbling in eugenics all the time, breeding ideal crops to replace less aesthetic or nutritious or hardy varieties; leveling forests to graze cattle or erect shopping malls and condos; planting groves of a few familiar trees that homeowners and industries prefer.

What an odd, ruminating, noisy, self-interrupting conversation we conduct with ourselves from birth to death.

Not much is known about alligators. They don't train well. And they're unwieldy and rowdy to work with in laboratories.

The more we exile ourselves from nature, the more we crave its miracle waters.

Words are such small things, like confetti in the brain, and yet they are color and clarify everything, they can stain the mind or warp the feelings.

We try to exile ourselves more and more from nature - not always consciously: We build houses; we dismiss nature; nature has to be outside, because we're inside. God forbid something like a cockroach comes inside, or some dust.

Above all, we ask the poet to teach us a way of seeing.