Stemistry lab

The illuminated gene

Rotate in the curl of a question mark, sinks in fluid but does not drown. It's the colour that befuddles most and the light emanating from it's centre.

By Christopher Barnes

Waiting for the orgasmobile to come

A song to Love, 2058

Surely there is more to life
than cowboy stem-cell banks.

Romance, gone.
The drugs-drop lads, moved on
to back-street deals in Orgasmobiles.

Step into the back of the motor:
Button A gets you a son
Button B gets you a daughter

Button C gets you a high
then leaves you wondering why
love is against the law.

No-one says I love you
or whispers, You're the one. Just
Press Button B for a daughter
Press Button A for a son.

By Catherine Graham

On the Mappa Mundi

Mixed up among accurate cities and rivers,
a world populated by strange creatures,
like the naked monopod on his back, solitary
leg in the air, using his giant foot as umbrella,
no distinction between natural and supernatural –
factual accounts of fish-men caught in nets
and shining men coming down from the sky.

And somewhere on this map, and in other
records, on the edges of the known, a race
of dog-head men, although no mention
of bitch-head women, like men in every detail
(eating the same food, living in villages,
and wearing the same raiment)    save one.
And what exercised The Church? Not the question

of their existence, but ‘Do these creatures have a soul?
Have some adopted Christianity? And so it carries on,
When does life begin? Does a foetus have a soul?
Can we bring salvation to hybrid embryos?

By Marilyn Longstaff