I fell toward myself…

Rev. 6/26

I am ancient.

I am newly arranged, but I’ve watched eons pass.

Peering into the void, I recognize my kin.

Hydrogen, helium, and carbon, forged in the furnaces of dying stars, 

Protons and neutrons crushed into existence by the cataclysmic demise of some sun,

Somewhere,

Somewhen, 

Pieces of me.

The death throes of other conflagrations carried this flotsam on waves of gravity, lending form to my formlessness, creating interstellar divots that pulled and spun me, 

and I watched, 

as I fell toward myself.

For billions of years I’ve been bound to this blue mote of dust spinning through the cosmos.

I am the planet. I was a mountain, a fern, a sea creature, a frightened scrap of fur, burrowing deep into the ground to escape yet another conflagration as it wiped the titans from the earth.

I was an ancestor to myself.

I was trapped beneath miles of ice, captured for epochs. When the sun touched me again, I grew into grass on a vast prairie and, later, strode heavily, across the plains under long tufts of dirty wool, trumpeting my arrival to man as he scampered upright into being. 

And, I have become Men…entering and leaving… becoming and unbecoming, remembering and forgetting over and over again. 

Though chance is harsh and time immeasurable, there are little  pockets of ancient things in me. By chance there are bundles of atoms whose shared origins stretch across time and space to the same stellar demise. Everything I have ever been began with destruction.

No wonder then that at night, sometimes I think I hear the quiet echoes of creation raining down from the stars, or that under their careful eye I hear ancient voices rising…recognizing me, reorganizing me into me.

Original ____________________________________________

I am ancient.

I am newly formed, yes, but I am ancient.

Peering into the abyss, I see myself.

Hydrogen, helium, and carbon, forged in the fires of dying stars…protons and neutrons bound together in some cataclysmic demise, they coalesced into me.

Rippling across the cosmos, the death throes of still other cataclysms scattered my atomic flotsam on gravity’s waves, lending form to my formlessness, creating eddies that pulled and spun me, and I watched, preconscious, as I fell toward myself.

For billions of years I’ve been gravitationally bound to this blue mote of dust spinning through the cosmos.

Before I became, I was the planet. I was a mountain, a fern, a sea creature, a frightened scrap of fur, burrowing deep into the ground to escape yet another conflaguration as it wiped the titans from the earth.

I was an ancestor to myself.

I was trapped beneath miles of ice, captured for eons. When the sun touched me again, I grew into grass on a vast prairie and, later, strode heavily, proudly across the plains beneath long tufts of dirty wool.