My body horizontal, face down
I push against the earth.
I push against the rock-skinned
molten core, spinning
space-top magnet.
I push against the mother sphere,
the curved blue breast
and the warped hand of physics
that holds me here.
In the body’s cosmos
cells collapse
like osmotic galaxies,
strands of creature
strengthen, stretched
on bone scaffolding.
When I stand again, I am stronger.
I arise with my breast full of blood
and stone flesh flexes,
animal power spun from gyred earth.
But what greater strength might I know,
what titan become,
if instead of a push I endeavored
with body lowered toward this vast
and fragile planet
an embrace of it?