I started off on a lengthy journey
and found myself in the cell's state
I was afraid lest I feel desperate
but instead I was startled with joy

What an incredible world is working
day and night with so many machines
in such harmony
that cannot even be found
in the most lavishly decorated churches

To pass through the gate
I had to go through a terrible control
guards, lipids, proteins, receptors
all of them check

whether you will pass the entrance
As soon as you enter
the State of the select
you will face thousands of machines
each one working separately
but in a magic way
all of them contribute to the effort
which coordinates this world

Even the most trivial electrons
know when to pass
through the membranes
they get energy from sugar
within the mitochondria
and thus, all the parts can move

Even if the code is hidden
in the dark abyss of the nucleus
again wisely the secrets pass
to the cytoplasm by a mysterious trail

They carry a code
secretly copied in letters
reaching
the endoplasmic reticulum network
and follow the pathway to the home
dressed in red colours
and magically we call it ribosomes
Quickly the code's tangled words
are assembled in order
with secrets they untangle
they synthesise the proteins for life

Workers come and go the hormones
in the nucleus, the cytoplasm,
the golgi, and everywhere
as though they are asking
from all the other parts
to obey only them

But here there is harmony
and very deep mystery
nature decorated with a magic crown
knits happily a web
which knows billions of aims every minute
and to compose the cell's
most melodic tune

A. Vlavianos-Arvanitis, 1982
(Collection of Poems Roots)