Dirt

Dear Darling, Dirty Dirt –

The other day I watched a worm.  It made its way across my path –- seeming to sprint a worm’s sprint, stretching, contracting, then reaching again –- on its way to you.  A worm’s way of running into the arms of the one it loves.   And I have to admit, I was a little jealous.

Let’s get down and dirty:  We’ve had a complicated relationship, you and I, but you have always been there for me.  Since the early days of my youth, when I reveled in your company, dear playmate, coming home covered head to foot in you (while somehow my Polly Flinders stayed pristine) to the latter days of our life together.  Partnering with you to grow a garden, you were growing me, and I understood you a little bit more.  But then, as it happens, I began taking you for granted, trampling you like yesterday’s weeds.

Still now and again, I imagine pressing down deep into your cool embrace, or letting you fall through my tingling fingers, or caressing your crumbling softness where – if I’m lucky -- I spot another earthworm wriggling deeper into its secluded place, a place I cannot go.   

Your richness so enriches me.  The sparkle of your minerals thrills me, and I delight in your mystery.  Your smell exalts me – it connects me to all that I was, all that I am, and all that, someday, I will become.  How is it that you love me?  You have more organisms in one tablespoon than numbers of people on Earth!  You formed us; you are part of me and I am part of you.

I marvel at the life you hold and the life you give.  The tiny creatures that wriggle and jiggle their way home remind me that you are teaming with infinite life I cannot see.  Multi-billions of organisms find their refuge in you, as you nurture all life in a cycle that I could never understand.  You are my hope this Advent season, my anticipation of the regenerative power of our Mother Earth.  And you’re a sneaky one, my love; your cold silence and stillness above conceals dynamic and vigorous life below.  Your beauty amazes me.  A symbiotic connection, yours and mine.

Forgive my foolish ignorance.  Forgive the erosion of our relationship, how I have degraded your love.  For I will never be able to thank you for all you do for me, dearest Darling Dirt -- oh, you misunderstood, unappreciated, avoided, stomped on, tossed about, and thrown-away precious Force of Life.  Forgive me my ignorance and thank you for the chance to love you even more deeply day by day as Mother Earth rouses us to a new morning. 

You hold the universe in every inch.  I am wholly yours and you are mine.  Forever.  Someday you and I will be one.  Then I will become a fertile part of your magnificence and life-giving power.  ‘Til then, let’s keep this little love secret between us; but always remember, my dear, the dirtier the better.   

Deeply and truly yours forever,

Me

Happy World Soil Day Today!                                                                     

https://www.un.org/en/observances/world-soil-day

10 Incredible Facts About Dirt:

https://www.audubon.org/news/10-incredible-facts-about-dirt

Photo by Ricardo Soria on Unsplash

A hand, speckled with clinging clumps of dirt, stretches out over a small, raised mound of dirt in a gentle caress of the earth’s curves. 

Submitted with a wink and a nod by Karla Hendrick