Us critters hanging out together
something like three billion years.
Three hundred something million years
the solar system swings around
with all the Milky Way -
Ice ages come one hundred fifty million years apart
last about ten million
then warmer days return -
A venerable desert woodrat nest of twigs and shreds
plastered down with ambered urine
a family house in use eight thousand years,
& four thousand years of using writing equals
the life of a bristlecone pine -
A spoken language works
for about five centuries,
lifespan of a douglas fir;
big floods, big fires, every couple hundred years,
a human life lasts eighty,
a generation twenty.
Hot summers every eight or ten,
four seasons every year
twenty-eight days for the moon
day/night the twenty-four hours
& a song might last four minutes,
a breath is a breath.
-Gary Snyder
