The stalactites and the stalagmites always fascinate me- our souls are also like these melting, solidifying calcium deposits in these age old ice-caves...


Soul Caves

I watch the water
Trickling down,
As if oozing out
Of the sweating rock
That assumes a human form
In the caves damp and cool
Becoming a haven of sorts
Sheltering me
From the sweltering heat
Of the outside world;
The stalactites and the stalagmites
Are the relics of
The history of
the age old drippings
Solidified, rock like...

My soul, in turn,
Freezes and melts,
Drips and solidifies...
Friezes of my emotions
Are etched
On the walls of my existence
-Fossilized-
Telling their tales
In words,
Created,
When the Hieroglyphs
Lost their meanings
In the Egyptians tombs

While, the Rosetta Stones
of my unnamed desires
Remain strewn on the floor
of the caves of my being,
Undecipherable even to myself;
Awaiting decoding...

Will some Champollion
Oblige...?


Author: Zoya Zaidi
Aligarh (UP), India
Copyright ©: Zoya Zaidi

Note:
Jean Frances Champollion worked out how to translate the Rosetta Stone of Egyptian Hieroglyphs in 1811.

Note: Shoshone Ice Caves are Idaho's best-known caves. In country that easily gets above 100 degrees in the summer, the caves maintain a constant interior temperature of 18 to 33 degrees.
The 1,000-foot-long cavern that is some forty feet high and varies in width from eight to thirty feet, at the far end of the cave is a wall of ice of unknown depth, despite repeated attempts to determine it.
Molten lava poured over the land now known as the Snake River Plain, bubbles, tubes, and fissures formed on a grand scale. Shoshone Ice Caves are actually a series of craters lying against a volcanic rampart that cooled earlier than the ice caves did.




Poetry by Zoya Zaidi
Read 1206 times
Written on 2007-09-16 at 10:28

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Winston Latanafrancia Soldevilla
You have done a very good research about this cavern. You also did an excellent metaphor out of this work. very descriptive too. You reminded me of my poem "A Nature's Journey". I should say it's a poem of great importance for it incorporated a wholistic study of every --phy it needed. e.g. history, geography..
I like it very much. interesting indeed!
2007-09-25


Rex Panthera
excellent metaphor. your description of the soul through inanimate objects is very well written.
2007-09-18


angelwings
Wow! Zoya this is so reflective and the flow of imagery amazing.
2007-09-18


Christian Lanciai The PoetBay support member heart!
Very interesting parable and thought-provoking... Bookmarked.
2007-09-16


Venkatesh India
Dear Zoya,
I liked particular the following words:

Friezes of my emotions
Are etched
On the walls of my existence
-Fossilized-

In 'Soul Caves'.
Thankyou,
Venkatesh
2007-09-16