my skepticism, my grandmother’s emeralded humming.

Before her humming, my child-father’s checkered laugh.

Before my father, the worm wriggling its way through

a drought. Before the drought, the lamentation-laden lake.

Before our lamenting, the wonder-watered field. Before

the field, our soundless worship, our feeble praise.

Before sound, the year nothing happened. Before nothing,

the all too much. Before much, the baby reaching

for the beginning long past. Before long, the baby

towering over my stunted growth. Before towers, a world

of language babbling over itself like the year of cicadas.

Before language, cicadas. Before cicadas, God

waking up from a nap. Before God, the night.

Before night, a dead universe dreaming of itself.

And then. And then. And then.