Soil Ecology

["Lawrence F. London, Jr." <venaurafarm@bellsouth.net>]

Behold this compost! Behold it well!

       Perhaps every mite has once form'd part of a sick person---
       yet behold!

       The grass of spring covers the prairies,
       The bean bursts noiselessly through the mould in the garden,
       The delicate spear of the onion pierces upward,
       The apple-buds cluster together on the apple-branches,
       The resurrection of the wheat appears with pale visage out of
       its graves.

       What chemistry!
       That the winds are not really infectious.
       That all is clean forever and forever,

       That the cool drink from the well tastes so good,
       That blackberries are so flavorous and juicy.

       That the fruits of the apple-orchard and the orange-orchard,
       that melons, grapes, peaches, plums, will none of them poison me,
       That when I recline on the grass I do not catch any disease.

       Now I am terrified at the Earth, it is that calm and patient,
       It grows such sweet things out of such corruptions,
       It turns harmless and stainless on its axis,
       with such endless succession of diseased corpses,
       It distills such exquisite winds out of such infused fetor,
       It gives such divine materials to men, and accepts such
       leavings from them at last.

       "/This Compost/," Walt Whitman [edited]