Poem: Holy Relics - Thomas Sabel

Who knew the relics wrought
by cross-bordered cell groups
(each unknown to the other):
Malay woodcutter, Chinese laborer, Liberian freighter,
a trucker from Michoacan, Burmese
grad student a second shift stocker,
Jolene the cashier eager for dates and breaks;
all linked hands (not heads, not hearts) to
birth that sacred treasure.
A paper smirched by childish scrawl
safe beneath Mother’s underthings.