20170304 (EPA)

God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue
 it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” NRSV, Genesis 1:22

That was the second time 

The Lord told creatures of his

Recently made world to fill 

The earth by being fruitful and

Multiplying. He’d already told 

All the birds of the air and the

Fish in the sea and every creature

Who creept upon the earth. But

Since on the sixth he used the 

Whole day to make humankind

Who hadn’t been there for the

General instruction he made it 

A second time to be specific 

Since they were also to have 

Dominion over the whole shebang.

Could be this was one of those

Instances, like Sodom and

Gomorrah or just before the

Flood, where he should have

Been a tad more specific 

About how much multiplying

He thought optimum, for it’s 

Pretty clear in the twenty-

First century he didn’t want

Our multiplying to prevent

Their Multiplying--such as 

Our making air unbreathable,

Overfishing, deforestation, 

Poisoning the waters, or

Rendering whole swathes

Of Ukrainian countryside or 

Japanese shoreline toxic to

Life for generations from

Windspread radioactivity.

The original reading sounded

A great deal more balanced

Than, “Hey, you’re in charge

Now. Wreck anything you 

Want.” Even primitive peoples,

Like the native Americans,

(Who didn’t have the benefit

Of Judeo-Christian texts to

Cloud their minds) knew enough

Not to kill all the buffalo. They

Didn’t have the fable about

Geese laying golden eggs either.

Nevertheless many early societies

Still did themselves in ignoring

The limits of their island homes

As Jared Diamond illustrates

In Collapse about how the Norse 

Starved in Greenland and the 

Peoples of Easter Island, having

Destroyed all their crops, took 

To cannibalism leaving only

Those majestic, mysterious 

Faces staring vacantly out to sea. 

c. J.S.Manista, 2017