You and Your Epigenetic Clocks

One speculation is that your cells
Begin to lose their identities
As you grow older and the cells age,

So the specialization that made
Heart heart, liver liver, and brain brain,
To say nothing of more precise types,

Begins to fade, and the specialized
System of specialists that is you
Begins to fade, too. Cancer’s only

The worst revolt, the cells that forget
Their identities altogether.
But everyone forgets, everyone

Demethylates, and the whole empire,
The hegemonic Pax Romana
That was you in your hip-swinging prime,

Begins to loosen, the supply chains
Sagging, more and more subsistence farms,
Fewer professional institutes.

Before barbarian prokaryotes
Swarm to vandalize the whole corpus,
You’re already starting to dissolve

Into a far more homogenous
Compost of similar eukaryotes
Retiring from the trades that raised you

Into the Colossus you once seemed.
Whether the speculation’s correct,
You always were spectacularly

Redundant, you and every other
Creature of teams. Specializations
And identities are only dreams.