Alex Smith

Decoding the Y Chromosome

 If you place a few toy trucks with two small boys,

they will likely weave these into a screenplay 

that will occupy the better part of an afternoon.

 

There will be drama and conquest and chase,

but often too, just when you think all hope is 

lost in the heat of battle, generosity.

 

I know for a fact that if a parent, with the best 

of intentions, withholds even toy guns 

from these boys, they will make Bren guns and 

M16’s from two-by-fours and dowel and glue.

And if you introduce dolls, they will shoot them.

 

I suspect when geneticists get to the very deep 

of that male chromosome one day, they shall find 

miniscule devices - little trucks and trains 

and tracks that spiral up along the 

phosphodiester backbone of the helix.

 

Little molar locomotives will be 

winding their way along those tracks, 

and little molecular men holding 

molecular carbines will be

shooting electrons across the divide,

 

perhaps even imagining little molecular girls 

over on the X, who would be looking on, 

but pretending not to.