The poems in this book evoke encounters with a number of living creatures, primarily in southern Africa. They range from the aardvark to the zebra, and include dragonflies, jellyfish, kudu, seahorses, and warthogs. The text invites the reader to consider animals not so much as beasts or feasts, pets or threats, but as our chromosome cousins. The book embodies recent discoveries in the fields of evolutionary biology, paleontology, and astronomy. These discoveries, when taken together, reveal how each animal is part of a lifeline that stretches back billions of years and is inseparable from the...