The Counting Under Our Skin

Facing the Fibonacci spiral
in the heart of the sunflower,
in the armor of the nautilus:

call it what you will,
accident or design, something
stirs when we see it.
It’s a sensible pattern, sure,

as are the hexagon
in the honeycomb
and the concentric circles
in the rain-pocked pond.
It’s a beautiful pattern, sure,

and when we have to say “beautiful”
or “inspirational” in the face of something,
when we have no choice,

(except of course as poets
we have to choose and change those words
but that’s
a different theology for another day)

when we have no choice but to gasp
and there’s nothing adaptive indicated
for gasping like this —

it’s a difficult thing, sure,
but what does it matter
what we call it?  It’s math
made flesh, an accounting
under our skin.