No Hands

We think first then our hands form
We mold the clay to our will
and we bend the metal to our imagined shape

So when we behold the formed
that far exceeds our skill to make
we see greater hands and further thought

But what furnace and what hammer
wrought all that lives and why?
Who dared by what art?

We stood in awe of one like us, beyond
But then in distant archipelagos, and deeper rocks
and in the twists of spirals, we observed

that in a rain of many eons passed
persistent patterns forge themselves
by nature's scythe and continuous election

Twice annealed in the crucible of time and each other
We're framed to look for works and mind and plans
And lifted up we wonder who made it all and us

It is a hard fought tale then to tell
that no immortal hand nor eye was found
And against all our intuition

that no one made the lamb
and no one forged the tiger
and that our hands are the ape's