GREGORY MACMILLAN

The human body.

Our magnificent instrument.

The temple, the vehicle, the vessel.

Source of so much pleasure and so much pain.

The instrument by which we make the world.

Its origins and sources.

Its monkey antecedents

and the pirouettes of a ballerina.

The hand of MichaelAngelo on his chisel.

The hand of Stradivari on his.

The terrible hand wielding the slicing sabre.

The finger on the trigger.

All the caresses, all the blows in anger.

The runner coming home from Marathon

with his news.

Leaping and stretching and curled in writhing agony.

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Our fingers and toes.

The atlas and axis, and the contents of the caput crowning the spinal column.

How much we share with every living creature.

And how much is uniquely our own.

And we take it all so much for granted.

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Health, well-being, and the effects our body has on others.