Synthesis

A reflection on the wonders and limitations of the senses

Under exceptionally good viewing conditions, if a person has 20/20 vision, they can see the Triangulum Galaxy. At around 3 million light-years away, it is thought to be one of the farthest objects visible from Earth by the human eye. If I look to the horizon from land or water, with an unobstructed view, I can see roughly 3 miles into the distance. Bound by this irregularly shaped ellipsoid, everything past the horizon line curves out of view. Wishful, I look to the night sky, then I sigh, releasing atoms of carbon into the world. I cannot see past what light pollution and poor air quality permits; an established perimeter of a crime scene. I turn to the familiar faces of our galaxy. Hello Moon. Hello Jupiter. Hello stars.

Some beings integrate the world with senses that humans do not have. I observe three little brown bats hunting for pray, knowing, but not understanding, that they use echolocation. I observe a mighty honeybee hard at work, navigating to patient flowers. Research suggests she can sense electric fields generated by plants by the way her hairs are deflected. The list of senses us Sapiens live without continues.

I strive to synthesize the world. To understand what I will never understand. In my minds eye, I am a carbon atom - taken in from the atmosphere by organic matter, stored in roots of summer’s restlessness. Respiration. Cycles. Severed into halves; quartered by vertical lines. The line cuts into the Earth’s crust. The living, the dead, and the very dead.

• The living is organic matter, and is the easiest for us to quantify: plant roots, residues, manure, and more, that are in the soil.

• The dead is the active carbon pool. It is where nutrient and aggregate glues are found. It is food for our future. It is food for our past. It is food for our failures. It is food for our promises. It is food for our food.

• The very dead is more commonly referred to as soil humus. It is where I link to others. In a healthy soil ecosystem we remain here, Earth’s largest terrestrial store of organic carbon. I am a part of the recalcitrant pool. The very dead, those most resistant to decomposition.

My eyes guide me up, up, up. Hopeful that tonight I will find the Triangulum Galaxy. Instead, ancient stories burned by genocide, greed, God, rise like smoke to the causal plane. Do I have a seat at the table? I feel the Earth warming. Others who have suffered far more than I, they need a seat. They need to rest. My Papap who died for something worth fighting for. The African elephant who starved while sitting with her breathless calf. All of the beings who are currently fighting for the greater good, willing or otherwise.

I smell soil’s whisper, and feel the familiar face of someone who is worth the risk. Wrinkles marking time. Ridges guiding safe passage. I close my eyes and I synthesize the world: God. The line that severs limbs, links carbon, and gives me a reason for hanging on, is an arc of a circle whose radius is infinite.