One Strange Rock

April 14, 2018

Prompt:  write a poem in which something big and something small come together.

To see the Earth as it hangs in space

And watch as patterns play out in panoramic scope,

This is the view of the astronauts who fly above us.

Sixteen sun rises and sunsets every day

Never obscured by clouds

But always brilliantly clear and stunning

Rising above the thin blue line of the atmosphere.

Out the windows they peer

And see things humans have never seen…

A view of the sun set against the black of space,

Not the azure blue of the sky,

And to know it as the star it truly is.

The Amazon obscured by the River in the Sky

That floats, massive, ever flowing

Until the brick wall of the Andes

Drains it of its moisture and

Feeds the mighty river below

Over and over and over again.

The magnetic field of the Earth made

Fully visible in the Aurora Borealis

Mesmerizing below their craft

As it plays and dances around the Pole.

Diatom blooms swirling in the ocean

Like oil meeting water, iridescently mixing,

Birthed by glaciers calving

And sandstorms blown a thousand miles

From one continent to the next.

Perspective is everything and brings with it

Feelings of awe

And gratitude

For this one strange rock we call home.