THIS flesh is earth refined, uplifted,
Quickened and colored, delicately sifted
With wind and sun and hidden streams
Of life long known in subterranean seams
Of ageless rock. One with pain,
Decay and birth of myriad forms
That laid the past-one with rain
And heat and primordial storms;
I would bless this interflowering
Of flesh and dust, but my soul wars
Incessantly against the earth—avowing
An older alliance with the stars.