ONE SPECIES ARE WE

(by Benedict Gagliardi lyrics,
melody 'Awake, Arise Good Christians' trad. Sheffield carol)

Of three domains of all life, eukaryotes are we 
Inside each cell within us, a nucleus there be
Bacteria, Archaea, unfortunate are they 
They have no membrane bound around their strands of DNA 

	Linnaeus! Linnaeus! Here's to your hierarchy 
	And let it not betray us! One species are we!

Come all you motile metazoans and listen to my song 
The kingdom Animalia is where we all belong 
The plants may have their chlorophyll to photosynthesize 
But animals are heterotrophs and so are the Fungi 

	Linnaeus! Linnaeus! Here's to...

Our backbone gives us structure, our backbone gives us strength 
So with the other chordates, we find our phylum rank 
But let our boney ego never be unfurled 
For the spineless worms and insects, they truly rule the world 

	Linnaeus! Linnaeus! Here's to...

By the milk our mothers gave us, by the hair upon our skin 
It's clear that we are mammals, class Mammalia we're in 
Most have a placenta, but this class has strange extremes 
Like the milky-pouched marsupials and egg-laying monotremes

	Linnaeus! Linnaeus! Here's to...

So let's put things in order, now that we've been to class 
With monkeys, apes, prosimians, we, the primates, do amass 
We all can be distinguished by our well-filled craniums 
And the envy of all other life: two fine opposable thumbs 

	Linnaeus! Linnaeus! Here's to...

Welcome to our family, all Great Apes are we 
Orangutan, gorilla and our cousin chimpanzee 
But if you believe bonobos just evolved into man 
It seems you treat your own brain just like a garbage can 

	Linnaeus! Linnaeus! Here's to...

Homo is the genus of the African bipeds 
Who stood erect, and picked up tools, and learned to use their heads 
Our cousins are extinct now, leaving only us 
But thanks to our bad habits, we may join them soon enough 

	Linnaeus! Linnaeus! Here's to...

So we are Homo sapiens but let us not forget
The reason we were given our specific epithet 
We earned it for our wisdom, we earned it for our brain 
Let fear and hatred ... never trump ... our consciousness again 

	Linnaeus! Linnaeus! Here's to...

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