Sunday, February 13, 2005

Acit Cràt Na

Antarctica's Monologue

My back is curved, the days and nights flicker on my covering of ice.
the winds blast across my dry skin down to the sea.
Are there others like me?
As I sleep, I feel the rhythm on my covers move with my breathing.
Life at my scale is grander than the lives of my parasites, but yet I wonder.
Are there others like me?
The ice calves, the winds circulate.
I have been bent by my ice coat, the glaciers flood down my spine.
Can I recall a time when I was not broken, not burdened?
White, and cold because of it.
Auroras wash and tickle my center.
At my edges, many trails bend the rocks and curve them.
How do I call from the bottom of the earth?
And who will hear?

Is the ice causing my life or deadening it?
So much subtlety is missing - so essential is my life - I can do without food,
I can do without air.
Yet, there is the spinning of the globe, the precession of the axes.
My day and night - so very extreme - causing my breath, but am I breathed?
Separation.
I was separated.
I tore off the other continents and floated south.
the river on my back became a sea; the whiter I got, the whiter I became,
and as I hug the bottom of the earth, whiter shall I become.
- - - - - - -
This is related to the Acit Cràt Na project.

1 comment:

Owlgarden said...

apparently, you've turned the heat off in your
house...turn it up and you'll be writing about
the equator...
(by the way, am I wrong in thinking that London's "to build a fire" is an inspiration?)
-o