Rubies By Catherine Zickgraf

Rubies
  
Across quilts of earthworks lies a monumental ditch. 
There henged with sunstones, blue under the sky pit
is sewn into the folded dirt and seas of buried bones.    
  
Under the regolith of soil, roots bend at the bedrock.
The planet’s skin spins its sway as life sweats away.
Hope measures the distance between pain and peace, 
energy released at crust-cracks, eternity spirals back.
  
Under the ruffled hills pressure turns silica to crystal.
Rocks carve rocks, hammers are hacking gems from 
the depths, to all but the richest of fingers: valueless.  

Two lifetimes ago, Catherine performed her poetry in Madrid. Now her main jobs are to write and hang out with her family. Her work has appeared in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Pank, Victorian Violet Press, and The Grief Diaries. Her chapbook, Soul Full of Eye, is published through Aldrich Press. 
 
Find her on twitter @czickgraf. Watch and read more at www.caththegreat.blogspot.com