Found Introduction

The great St Mark’s Cathedral in Venice, 

the dome radially symmetrical,

each quadrant meets

one of the four spandrels.

Below the dome,

spandrels tapering triangular spaces.   

Two rounded arches at right angles are

byproducts of mounting a dome.  

Spandrel, a design fitted into its space, 

sits in the parts flanked 

by the heavenly.

Below a man,

representing one of the four biblical rivers 

Tigris, 

Euphrates, 

Indus, 

Nile, 

pours water 

from a pitcher in the narrowing space.

Below his feet

is elaborate.  That we to view it

as sense of the surrounding

necessary spandrels. 

They a space which the mosaicists worked.

They set the symmetry

such abound.  

We do not impose our biological biases upon them, 

a series. 

http://faculty.washington.edu/lynnhank/GouldLewontin.pdf