Life Is Everywhere
Flesh and stone.
Heart of the land, the life of the skies,
the medusa and the snail.
Red giants and white dwarfs.
The fabric of the heavens.
Everywhere being is dancing.
With gratitude to the authors of these books: Lucy Ives, Richard Sennett, various authors edited by Joseph Barbato and Lisa Weinerman of the Nature Conservancy, Jonathan Rosen, Lewis Thomas, Robert Jastrow, Stephen Toulmin and June Goodfield, and Robert Bringhurst.
I’m also grateful to Monroe County Public Library and Wells Library at Indiana University for the use of the first and last books appearing in the poem. The good thing about keeping a stack of library books on the corner of the dining table is that sometimes when I’m eating, my eyes rest on them, and an idea occurs.
This, like all of your other book spine poems, is brilliant. Your musings at the end are as beautiful and as interesting as the poems themselves.