From the Great Rift Valley, An Echo

At dawns first light
I stood in the valley. 
Some call me Adam
But I have no name at all. 

What soft, satisfied mouths
could survive here? 
Knowing no constant
but change. 

I was born with builders hands
but the valley built me,
Something greedy and jealous
of what was once just hungry. 
Something zealous and afraid. 

With my hands I invented
the calendar, 
I divided up the day
into hours-

still,
I could not control
the coming of rain
or the force of a flood. 

In the valley there were
starving years
and drowning days, 
but in between was bounty. 

Deer walked between our spears, 
and fruit fell at our feet. 
One man tamed fire, 
and someone discovered wheat. 

But even in this feasting, 
we remember
bitter tastes of drought, 
and in this fearing we forgot
that we could do 
without. 

——
But nimble hands and fingers
loved the valley. 
I stood with my mother
in the valley, 
and the valley was me. 

(I beg you to return to the earth) 

How high it's walls 
I'll never know
I only stood by the river
watched it flow. 

(I beg you to imagine) 

Beware this curled vision, 
white as snow. 
I only stood by the water
asking what the water knows. 

(you are owed nothing
but the sky you were born under.
and I beg you to listen.)

c. m. s., 23, America.