Geological Eras Later²
I give my Pain some Geologic Perspective³
I have been the same for a Thousand Years
And for a Thousand more, I will be the Same⁴
Bowed by the Weight of Centuries – we Lean⁵
We think so much in terms of Thousands of Years –
We have a hard time gitting ourselves through One⁶
Once in a Hundred Years I open my lips to Speak
And my Voice echoes Mournfully in the Void⁷
Hidden by the Unstirred, Untrodden Siftings
Of how many Years – how many Centuries?⁸
It’s not our part here to take thought only
For a Season, or for a Few Lives of men,
Or for but a Passing Age of the world⁹
A Billion Years, he Winks – Another¹⁰
¹ Philip Whalen, Memoirs of an Interglacial Age
² Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird
³ Christina Olson, Reconstruction Errors, Part 1 & 2
⁴ Circe Maia tr. Jesse Lee Kercheval, Discrepancies
⁵ Edwin Markham, The Man with the Hoe
⁶ Alice Walker, The Color Purple
⁷ Anton Chekhov tr. Constance Garnett, The Sea-Gull
⁸ Ursula K. Le Guin, The Tombs of Atuan
⁹ J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring
¹⁰ Shinkichi Takahashi tr. Stryk & Ikemoto, Flight of the Sparrow