1   The Garden of Eden
     was not about feeding
     an apple to a man
     but how shame began.

2   Our attempt to explain
     why childbirth begets pain
     invoked God, sex and sin.
3   Sad way to begin.

4   When Cain struck down Abel
     (according to fable)
     he invented warfare.
5   We took it from there.

6   The Ark built by Noah
      ferried two protozoa,
     and then four and then eight.
7   Disease was First Mate.

8   The Flood begat Rainbow,
     a sign, so claimed Noah,
     of God's misgivings for
     culling the living.

9   The leftover rabble
     assembled at Babel
     to build a tall tower.
10  Nui ka huikau.

11  Covenants fell like rain
     on the grandsons of Cain.
12  God's strangest provision:
     male circumcision.

13  Sodom and Gomorrah
     lacked ten men of morals
     so The Lord burned them down.
14  At least no one drowned.

15  Abraham gripped his knife
     to cut short his son's life
     and flesh out God's design.
16  God said, "Never mind."

17  Abraham's Sarah and
     Jacob's Rachel -- barren.
18  Their mates took more women:
      more sons were given.

19  Was this really how man
      supposedly began?
20  Given what men now do,
      much of it rings true.