"A Blaze of Changes"

The Age of Water

Primordial Water

Virgin Birth

“Salt”

The first word
in the place
where it all begins.

“Fire”

The age of Twenty Tribes,
Twenty Languages
in twenty square miles of Eden.*

Diaspora

“Blaze of changes”

The Age of Two Tribes,
East of Eden, West of Eden.

Theologians’ courage
in the wilderness of tongues,
searching for Eden’s Fruit.

Machines
Oil

“A Blaze of Changes”

The Age of Wealth

Eclipsed the age of children
Eclipsed the age of women
Corrupted the age of men

Rising whitecaps
on ancient surf.

The Age of Water

Where it all began,
where it is ending now
in the soft slip
of surf on sand.

***

Title from George Oppen’s “Myth of the Blaze”

*Twenty Measures of Chitchat by Terrance Hayes