Made in China

I wonder how many millions of small white worm cocoons were unraveled to make his tie. I imagine vast fields of them, confined and shining, hanging somewhere in an overseas warehouse under yellow lights lost... Read More
Life Without a Spine

Taxonomists have described more than a million species ... divided into more than twenty phyla. Of this plethora, vertebrates represent only part of one phylum, and a mere 40,000 species or so. —Stephen Jay Gould... Read More
Calendrical Reform

Constantine’s victory in the Battle at the Milvian Bridge (shown here in part of an unfinished painting by Le Brun) gave him total control of the Western Roman Empire and paved the way for Christianity... Read More
Humanist Voices in Verse: “Hadrian Jr.’s Wall”

This week's poem is by Brian C. Felder, a widely published poet currently writing from his home in rural Delaware. If you’d like to contribute original poetry to Humanist Voices in Verse, write to write@thehumanist.com... Read More
Humanist Voices in Verse: “Interregnum and Coronation”

INTERREGNUM AND CORONATION, a villanelle* by Neil Doherty The villanelle has a strict rhyme scheme and the first and third lines are repeated several times over six short stanzas. The formal nature of this type... Read More
Leonardo Flies Home

Leonardo Da Vinci, took his place across the tiny aisle from me, and buckled the belt of his seat. I was certain it was him. Too timid to speak, I listened as he told... Read More
AT WINTER

[caption id="attachment_18103" align="alignright" width="250"] Hasui Japanese Woodblock Print Shimoda 1937[/caption] The moon’s a fat convict of the stick-stalk trees then escapes, a desperado loose in the yard, a bruising undresser of raw light, naked of... Read More