Caravel

All genes are junk,
Luggage, books
Dragged along

The long voyage,
Clogging the hold
Of each vessel

That lugs them,
A traveling library
Of tragedies,

Histories, adagia,
Accumulated damages,
Natural disasters,

Such a soggy, complex,
Parasite-encrusted,
Boggy mess,

That tells us
How to be what
Our ancestors

Might have been,
That worked at the time,
For them,

And still does for us
When we're not sinking, 
Now and then.