The Fluid Earth

“The earth is not a mere fragment of a dead history, stratum upon stratum, like the leaves of a book, to be studied by geologists and antiquaries chiefly, but living poetry like the leaves of a tree, which precede flowers and fruit,--not a fossil earth, but a living earth….”

~ Henry David Thoreau, Walden

I really like this quotation, not only because it is very poetic (always a plus, even with things that end up meaning absolutely nothing!), but also because it reminds me that we don’t observe the natural world in stages, but in constant transformation. Although we categorize years by the four seasons, there is such a blending between winter and spring that it’s impossible to pinpoint where one ends and the other begins. This passage therefore brings to mind the fluid metamorphoses which are fundamental to nature.