11.11.2003

here's another section from My Byzantium (actually this was swiped from a brochure about a state park in southern MN). (poem appeared in Way Stations)

9


The quartzite ridge you are now standing on
is about 23 miles long, 800 feet wide, and rises
some 100 to 300 feet above the nearby
agricultural fields.

The hard, red-to-pink Sioux
quartzite exposed here is one of the oldest
bedrock formations in Minnesota and was deposited
originally as red sand

all the glyphs at the Jeffers
site were produced by pecking with a pointed rock
held in the fist and used as a punch
struck with a hammerstone

carvings that resemble
bird tracks can be found

turtles, geometric designs,
bison figures, stylized thunderbirds,
and birds in flight

a long-legged animal glyph
which could represent a horse

Dragonfly and linked circles.
The dragonfly is a common Dakota motif,
and the linked circles were often
used. . . to depict the passage of time.

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