If God had stopped work after the third day / With Eden full of vegetables and fruits, / If oak and lilac held exclusive sway / Over a kingdom made of stems and roots, / If landscape were the genius of creation / And neither man nor serpent played a role / And God must look to wind for lamentation / And not to picture postcards of the soul, / Or would he hunger for a human crowd? / Which would a wise and just creator choose: / The green hosannas of a budding leaf / Or the strict contract between love and grief?

Linda Pastan (1932-),  Modern Poems of the Bible – An Anthology, edited with an introduction by David Curzon, publ. by JPS, 1994, p. 39 – based on Genesis 1:6-13