The umbilical cord delivers essence, sparkle, verve and vigor. The twists, kinks and turns tell of trails yet to be taken, winding into the future. Blood vessels within this aqueduct are serried with stem cells, fountains to measured dominion, flumes of primary color blending on to the retina, fumes incensing the nares, flavors savoring the tongue, electrons charging tactile synapses, and pulsating rhythms against tympanic membranes tuned to two beating hearts today and hearts of unending tomorrows. This raveled conduit nurtures major organs, marrows bones and delivers maternal hormones to charge the brain with emotion and open receptor gates for knowledge. Then birth. The umbilical cord is severed and clamped. From a circuitous vein precious stem cells are collected, DNA sequenced, frozen, and saved.---Fifty years go by. Thinned by shrapnel, the remaining muscle fibers of a chambered heart are near exhaustion when stem cell generated stranded contractile fibers join their brothers in concert. Others follow. Days later a wounded soldier walks. A year later his newborn daughter\'s umbilical cord is clamped, then needled to harvest precious stem cells for unending tomorrows.
Augustus / Houston, TX / June 2017