Out of the Stone Age

One of her stone-babies,

he took three weeks to birth, was left behind

in the cold Arctic north

in a sculpture garden.

Touched by northern lights

glanced in his smooth stone contours grooves she grooved

by chiselling into his garnet crystals symbols of the southern cross.

She softened his skin

with fine then finer diamond discs, wooly muffs and tin oxide

til he shone - not with mere frippery -

but like a jewel of protest.

Chunks cracked off her heart.

To give up her infant - a mark of her time - to driving snows

and empty smashing bottles lobbed

from the hands of discontent.

Signs of southern squalor

old tires, plastic bags and rusting cans litter streams, rock shores

and in some indigenous veins is

spent alcohol and southern desires.

Bones and hides don't litter greed.

Stones carved or stacked were simple signs to the old and wary.

Some can see the passing of an age.

Some are already blind to the stone.

Leaving your mark is erosion.

Inside and out, great gorges span opposing eras of stone and fuel.

Iridescent puddles shimmer with spills

and circle her baby in the garden.

Denise Reiser

[9]

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