Color Vision Crawls Out Of A Petri Dish Poem by Kimberly Burnham

People are going blind
scientists search for a cure
new treatments for macular degeneration
glaucoma and leading causes of vision loss
crawl out of a Petri dish
struggling to win National Eye Institute competitions
retinal organoids secure million-dollar prizes

Before today color seeing developed only in the womb
away from inquisitive eyes
the process now replicated for all to see
understanding dawns on how nature controls
the sight of a red sunset
the green of spring leaves
human eyes need the right thyroid hormones
at the right time
tiny human fetuses detect blue light first
then come cells responding to red and green

A year it takes a batch of immature retinal cells
scientists caring for them daily for a few weeks
then like infants the Petri dish cells
become independent developing Color-sensing Cones
in the Center of the dish as nature does in the eye