Now we are empires:
our bodies roll against each other,
two vast sacks of cytoplasm,
each with forty trillion
specialized, quarrelsome
citizen cells.
But before we met,
before the treaties
drawn up between us,
for the first day of our lives,
you and I were each
a single cell,
solitary travelers
through the corridors
of our mothers' bodies.
(First published in Axe Factory Review)