Elan Mudrow
Smidgens
Sweet Dirt (Portrait 10)
You thought it would’ve been water and initially you were right. Then, the ocean changed. No one was surprised. After all, that’s what we do, change, survive, change again if we don’t die first. Not very poetic. What nipped us in the ass was the increasing storm surges and haunting fires. Beautiful when viewed from a computer screen, the greys of wind whipped sea, the coal red of fire eating its way through forests. Sometimes I think voyeurism is humanity’s best quality. We gaze at beauty and swallow it, holding it in, while it eats at us from the inside. Damn, if it wasn’t for beauty, we might’ve been better off.
And so, it came down to dirt, sweet dirt. This is what we had to learn to respect. Funny….learning how to respect something. You think we had already learned. Again, you’re wrong. No wait, I’m wrong. Because now I know. We needed to worship dirt, not carve it up, colonize it, bend it, treat it like infinity. I could wash my hands a thousand times and this dirt would always stain my fingers. I’m ingrained with the soil. You’re the same as me.
Now scarce, we look for the sweet spots, where the dirt is still alive, wormy, nutrient filled. We’re hunters of dirt.
22 Comments on “Sweet Dirt (Portrait 10)”
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Elan Mudrow 
Great write oozing with truth.
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To Live a life of true self instincts is what I carve for… Well articulated views.
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Wisdom spoken. Love it!
XxX
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Ah. This is wonderful, and deep. Like dirt. Many thanks.
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Favorite line: “Sometimes I think voyeurism is humanity’s best quality.” That is future blog post material for you!
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Amazing write 🙂
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This is so well written and beautiful!
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Lovely mix of the two forms.
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Thanks!!!!!!
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Omg loving your writing
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This is so beautiful and elemental. Your images capture my spirit.
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A powerful piece of writing.
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Now change dirt into a person and you discover the poem inside the science fiction.
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Not enough people respect dirt. Thought provoking imagery.
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I love mention of ‘saccharin scent’. Just wonderful.
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deep and beautiful, like rich soil. my land is a worm — and bee — preserve
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mmm maybe everything’s alchemical transformation and growth, like songbirds transforming fruit to worship, or the soil bestowing it’s properties on the things it nurtures, the rebirth of water as liquid.steam.liquid in an endless shivaite cycle of reincarnations for eternity…..
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Thanks so much!
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I really like the last sentence, “we’re hunters of dirt”. It’s such a statement and a beautiful way to end this story. As always, brilliantly expressed!
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A wonderful write with so much truth in and between every line.
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And here’s a thought: Earthen dirt seethes, thrives, blooms with life. And has done so for billions of years. Martian dirt, regolith, is dead. And lifeless as it is, may be incapable of harboring new life brought from Earth. Dirt may be sweet because of the life within it – algae, bacterium, mold, fungus, the desiccated bodies of prior inhabitants — all contribute to its saccharin scent. Without dirt’s organic history, life seed on foreign lifeless soil may never flourish.
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The proof is under my fingernails. You’ve dug deep and touched my spirit, again.
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