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Oh numbers, numbers what do you mean?
Could it be that I am not as I seem?
Are my thoughts and hopes as I lay awake
Something you with symbols can calculate?
And my mind, the thing I think is pure Me
Obey equations? You mean it's not free?
My silent me-ness, my intimate life
Is no more than a fancy traffic light?
As enzymes and atoms concatenate
Or catalyse to keep my steady state
Are you there, in shadows, calling the shots?
Directing towards the most probable plots?
And what of that thing I once called my soul?
Have mechanisms too this from Me stole?
Have love and mercy and hope no more worth?
Am I resigned to emotional dearth?
If Me results from my neurons and brain
With no spark, no soul, no God at the reins
How could I hope for a more perfect dawn?
For justice? For peace? For life when breath's gone?
And how will my children know good from bad?
And where now is my balm of Gilead?
It's just not fair numbers! Out of the way!
I like Me; my me-ness is here to stay.
Keep on your work, but you had best pipe down.
Count quickly, smartly, but without a sound.
Yes, some things you'd better work faster at,
Like treatments for cancer and heart attack.
Go quantify disease, drugs and what-not;
But Me and me-ness, would be best forgot.
Footnotes
Competing interests None.
Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; internally peer reviewed.