Nature does not ask me
The shape of names I’ve answered to
She asks only that I return my body, broken and fully inhabited 
Back to her process of patient undoing.

Nature sees me for what I am — a burst of energy, 
built on generations of combinations
of energy and gases and mineral and bacteria
No more and no less.

The cougar sees only the taut flesh separating head from body
As a canvas to engulf with sharpened teeth. 
Her and her children’s eternal hunger the artist’s brushes
Which paint the sky with their hot breath.

The mitochondria see only an opportunity to transmute
The body of one creature into mine, and then into the next 
As bodies shape-shift life apparitions through time
Oscillating, bending, binding, unwinding.

That I may take my place among all the lineages of life, 
one link on a long interwoven chain of being
Through which we all pass
Like water.

Crashing and craving
Destroying, delivering, dancing
while we are awake.

—

DENISE HEARN is Long Now's Director of Strategic Initiatives. She spoke at Long Now in 02024 about how our economic stories shape the world.