A Lesson in Deep Time for Birch Malotky by John Haworth
I stand atop history and geology, Mineral Mountain, El Dorado. This continent continues its slow tilt towards the sun on the axis of season. Beneath the melting snow the Earth is alive with the damp smell of vernal growth germinating. Thrush and Warbler sing of their return. The retreating snow reveals scat and tracks of Ungulates, life leaving its impression in its perpetual migration following sun and season. I stand at the edge of a bare outcrop, rocks atop one another in perfect balance. I close my eyes. The world is alive in sound and silence. The sun is warm on my lips. The rocks beneath my feet give way, life out of balance. I fall forward slowly, there is no Earth to hold me. I fall into the valley until I am caught by dirt and rock far below. The impact is not subtle yet, I do not stop. I continue to pass through the membrane of sand and soil. My ears bleed gravity. I am no longer me.
SPON SORS Arno & Brenda Niemand
I am Mammoth footprints in the White Sands of time, not fossilized, but fresh impressions appearing and disappearing for the first time in thousands of years; simple Paleolithic patterns, daydreams of human mind.
Caccavallo Investment Consulting Kelley & Forsyth Financial Consulting Group James E Johnson, Complex Manager
FCI Constructors Inc. FirstBank JB Fieldworks John & Jill Sheldon Webroot
38 April 26 , 2018
Ross Management Group Boulder Luncheon Optimist Club Kingsbery CPA’s Deneuve Construction
Avery Brewing Co. Ron’s Printing Suerte Tequila Altitude Spirits Whole Foods Market® Boulder
The sediment of cells erodes beyond Cenozoic. I am crust and dust compressed and fossilized, an Igneous intrusive dreaming of magma mother. Nightmare of extinctions propels acceleration
through Mesozoic sandstone into Paleozoic apocalypse. Permian-Triassic extinction: life nearly ends. Cambrian explosion: life begins. Metamorphic metamorphosis, loss of memory. Long descent through Precambrian geology, the history of Earth alone onto itself. Mind becomes molten. Parts split apart, an annihilation of being, non-existence at the core of self. Bright abyss, consume and shape me into solid centrifugal inner sphere; Coriolis force erupting magnetic field and gravity. I move away from the center of mass. Inner core, outer core, mesosphere mantle, asthenosphere, lithosphere. I fall through fissures, an Igneous extrusive erupting at the bottom of the sea. I am an island with a hot tempered tongue. I vomit flame and ash. The sky breathes me and I block out the sun. My eyes fly open. I catch my breath in ragged gasps atop the bare outcrop. A dark cloud has passed before the sun. It is going to snow. The birds have flown away. All is silent, waiting. The dry smell of Winter still clings to my clothes. I follow my footprints home, the impression of me already eroding. I look back in time to see the rock fall. Its violent journey rings in my ears until its final silence punctuates the last sentence on the last page in the book of life written in stone.
John Haworth is a word-enthusiastic bibliophile in charge of cramming books in their proper places between writing poetry and scooping ice cream. He lives in Nederland.
Boulder Weekly