Magma

Since it is national poetry month and I spent ten minutes watching magma ooze on the big screen last night, it seems like a good time to publish the following poem. The imagery was from a local film festival documentary about the perception of “time”…how it was an element of space, the philosophical debate over its existence, hypothetical questions surrounding it, and how nobody can in reality make true sense of it. The obvious joke was the producer failed to show because he didn’t have enough time. One of the fellows interviewed had built a home 30 years ago in Hawaii. Over the last 10 years, lava from nearby volcanic activity slowly destroyed the surrounding lush tropical forest as well as every one of his neighbors’ homes. He was the last man standing amidst a black burning backdrop far as the eye could see. He quoted something similar to, “out here the days drag on and the years fly by.” Since I don’t have enough time to further analyze time, here is something I wrote in 2004 and reworked last year. It’s an enigmatic metaphor about magma/lava and how islands are created slowly over time through volcanic activity...


Down deep inside the devil’s den
Ye mix and meddle in evil spin

Torching the souls sucked within
Carved satan’s face a vicious grin

Formless fury inside his tomb
Trapped behind ocean’s womb

Earth in labor for unknown years
Rainfall above her stricken tears

Suddenly a violent birth
Sets thee free from hell’s girth

Plates divided, time has spoken
Seal of spirits, shaken and broken 

Reaching not for heaven’s sky
Only the water surface so high

Darkness remains, but not for long
Translucent light, a lost bird’s song

Catching aloft a gasp of air
Yet waves roll over without care

Stages and ages, hot lava spew
Until high tide no longer flood you

Coconuts roll upon your shore
Plants and animals inhabit galore

Pirates shall come and bury treasure
Leaving no mark nor mile for measure

Papers in bottles, footprints in sand
War and peace, bodies in land

Digging may find vain pure riches
Try not uncover wrath of witches

Centuries pass and long await
The final day of judgment fate