archaeolog

The Empath strokes the weathered stone,

Evoking tactile images: smoothness, yielding warmth,

the prickle of dust.

Deeper she buries her SELF in the layered history

Of this freighted artifact;

Sensations of electrostatic force, gravitic repulsion,

Odors of ozone and dust, a hint of exotic organics --

Perfume of the vanished owner? Or a cleaning agent.

Deeper. The present is the path to the past.

Give up the present, abandon all connections.

The tinkling of chimes, low-frequency rumblings, oddly syncopated,

(speech?), briefly, a cacophony of noise.

Deeper....the empathic sphere yields love, pride;

These may be the fossilized emotions of the artist itself!

The empath's excitement shocks her partway out of the trance,

Relax, find the receptive frame, receive the past, live it

The emotions return, stronger, they live,

She IS the artist: a fragment of vision sears the mind's

Eye. The artifact is perceived in the moment of creation,

Whole, new, and in its proper frame of reference.

Time, considered as an onion of detritus,

Peeled to its core of fossil NOW.

But where perception reaches, understanding still may fail.

The empath spirals outward to her NOW of shattered relics;

Striving to comprehend the lives that now are dust.