Effigy Hand by Hopewell Culture (USA) 100 BC to 400A
By Catherine Young
Mica’s translucent layers let light in –
the mottled light of material earth, veined and branching
like trees and blood-bearing arteries.
Carved mineral mixes gold and green like fields of corn,
woven baskets carrying earth.
Fingers once lengthened and branched,
mounded earth into eagle, turtle, lizard, snake.
Hopewell sister, if my hand were carved of stone, could I then
reach across to you, centuries
and generations beyond our tended gardens
sprung from your carefully kept seeds?
You are still with us
through Dakota
Choctaw,
Chickasaw,
Maskoke
Osage
Pawnee
Wichita
Oto
Iowa
Ho Chunk
We gather on your earthworks
align with solar calendar
as our light-filled hands touch yours.
“Effigy Hand by Hopewell Culture (USA) 100 BC to 400AD,” by Catherine Young selected for Lucky 7 Ekphrastic Marathon Anthology, 2022, The Ekphrastic Review.
Mica’s translucent layers let light in –
the mottled light of material earth, veined and branching
like trees and blood-bearing arteries.
Carved mineral mixes gold and green like fields of corn,
woven baskets carrying earth.
Fingers once lengthened and branched,
mounded earth into eagle, turtle, lizard, snake.
Hopewell sister, if my hand were carved of stone, could I then
reach across to you, centuries
and generations beyond our tended gardens
sprung from your carefully kept seeds?
You are still with us
through Dakota
Choctaw,
Chickasaw,
Maskoke
Osage
Pawnee
Wichita
Oto
Iowa
Ho Chunk
We gather on your earthworks
align with solar calendar
as our light-filled hands touch yours.
“Effigy Hand by Hopewell Culture (USA) 100 BC to 400AD,” by Catherine Young selected for Lucky 7 Ekphrastic Marathon Anthology, 2022, The Ekphrastic Review.