Of Our Origins

        A Poem by Timothy Stathis

 

Out from the Sun of our System,

From the very soil that is Earth,

The place from which all humanity has been born,

Appeared, somewhere in the past, our Family,

And thus, the beginning of the evolution

of who we are.

 

Out from the Sun, nourishing all life,

every part of life –

for countless generations back

We have been connected, as a stream – flowing back,

back to a source.

 

But how far back?

 

We stand in relationship,

We are cognizant of the living presences,

of three generations –

three generations connected,

that establish who we are in the present.

 

Further back than that,

there are connections, though those,

are moreso as the original elements

which have formed the present compounds….

then formed into the generations, (precursors of the three) then,

that forged our identity.

 

But at those points, any and all points

from which we can trace back something of ourselves to a point of Origin

if a direct knowledge of such can be made and preserved,

there materializes a genesis of existence,

Life as Stories –

Stories of our distant past, making connection to us.

These being not-so-much defining of that which has made us who we are,

other than the general association of our consciousness

as connected to all evolving humanity,

and we, a place therein, an identity there-among.

Yet, they give us our traced Origin, part of the "Great Story"

of who we are in the world among all with whom we live.

 

Stories are good, stories are meaningful,

and thus also, beyond the search for meaning

within the purview of the three generations,

our relatives within reach, most close to our awareness,

those for whom we have knowledge in the present generation,

those we know or have known of the previous generation,

and our connection to the generations before that,

beyond this, further into that Parallax into the distant past –

are stories, whether written or not-yet-written,

stories of our lineage, of lives to be remembered

for having made our lives possible.

 

Worthy of our Time, is time spent,

to enter into their lives

to inquire of, to read, and understand, and know.

 

Valuing this establishes reason and purpose,

for telling and establishing our present stories –

not only for the next generation

and their connection to identity and understanding

of that which has forged them in who they are,

and in the generation after that.

 

But as all that effort goes forward into the future –

these stories that we establish today as our Present,

the stories of our present, and one generation or two generations back –

will give meaning to existence unto our progeny,

and others dear to them, their present

in connection to us, and who we have been,

in an ever evolving continuum into the future.