Fruits Of Genealogy Research Poem by Roger Gerald Hicks

He and his newly found cousin
exchange letters
every day -email.

His relatives are pedestrian
hers the opposite
He adds one farmer
after another;
She adds governors
statesmen and authors.

They are from the same vines
the best soil of Virginia
and Kentucky, sprigs
from Maine, yet
she traces lineage
to the Mayflower Plantation
governor.

Somehow for whatever reason
his tribe wandered around
in the desert-
Hers watered the desert
made it flourish
cultivated the sweetest dates.

They examine their
respective trees -
separated by more
than one grandfather
more than a single man's
special genes

It is as if her tree
attracted genius
and ferocious stubbornness
his genius
and political apathy.

And so here
they are, identical IQ's-
one a thoroughbred;
the other a mustang.
Balanced- Balanced
but not equal.