Gnashing Teeth Publishing

| words that get in your teeth

Dirt by Jeremy Snyder

And as the rocks melt on this soup skin,  

in this pot left on simmer for a few million years,  

these memories push up through the soft spots.  

 

And when God’s mashed potatoes have risen above the gravy,  

as the earth pushes food around on its plates,  

the crust commences its toasting.  

the sky is brought closer to taste  

Then boils and wrinkles form  

and clouds are told to wait.  

 

And as the memories return to the topsoil,  

where  

layer upon layer of evolutionary mistakes  

and miraculous achievements of a certain age  

ferment and transfuse  

the translators of sun,  

the birthplace of roots,  

the netting of continents,  

the boots   

of Zeus.  

 

And as those seeds are carried by   

a prepubescent storm  

to lava fields with hollow veins,  

where trees will drink the fog and steam.  

 

Plant becomes tree,  

tree becomes soil.  

 

And as the microbes nestle into corrosive roles  

chewing rock into bites they can swallow  

they burp air into the ground   

for the fungus to follow  

 

And as grasses form the scalp of aquifers  

trapping the brain in this celestial solution  

from which,  

 

we rise for a time,  

to look around,   

to observe.  

We splatter the surface with language and colors.  

We use whatever energy we can harness to learn as much as we can  

before that energy runs out  

 

And then,  

 

we return to the ground.  

We return to the soup.  

 

These memories are made of dirt.  

My Name is Jeremy Snyder.

I am a 46 year old man who lives in Vallejo, California

Where I am currently the Poet Laureate

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