I am the atom, silent seed—
Born in the first bright thunder,
I’ve spun through stars in endless
need,
And watched their dust go under.
When Earth was fire and cooling stone,
I sailed in winds unhurried
Through clot of cloud and ancient bone,
In glaciers bowed and buried.
I shimmer in your fleeting gaze,
Enmeshed in dream and motion—
Your lives are but ephemeral haze
Whirled on a restless ocean.
You guard your clocks and count your days
In fevered hope and hurry,
While all the joy that sunlight lays
You overlook in worry.
But I—observer, nomad, spark—
Will watch your cities falter,
Your songs dissolve into the dark,
Your names no record altar.
Beyond the death of earth and sun,
In voids, in nova’s burning,
Each age will end, and life begun
Will fail or keep on turning.
On worlds that never heard your tale
Where unknown rivers glisten,
Earth’s fleeting blue, now frail and
pale—
No ear remains to listen.
Still I persist, a changeless mote
In cycles without number;
Through all the stories you devote
To loss—and joy and wonder.
So waste no hour, no gentle day—
The pulse of time is thinning.
What you let love or light betray
I’ll carry from your beginning.
