“Whispers of the Stone” – A Poem by Kassidy Dioso

 “Whispers of the Stone” – A Poem Inspired by the Rock Cycle

I was born in fire, my veins aglow,

Then rain and river wore me slow.

I sank in silence, layer on layer,

Till pressure shaped me with quiet care.

Time passed—mountains fell, seas rose again,

I hardened with fossils and stories of men.

The heat returned, I broke, I shone,

Marble from limestone, reborn in stone.

This poem is a meditation on the rock cycle, the natural cycle through which Earth’s materials are continually transformed. Starting with igneous rocks, born in molten fire; moving to sedimentary rocks, formed by deposition of sediments like sand, mud, shells, fossils; and finally transformed into metamorphic rocks by heat and pressure deep inside Earth.

According to Britannica’s article on sedimentary environments, these environments — whether rivers, lakes, deltas, or oceans — are dynamic archives. They record climate changes, sea level fluctuations, and biological activity, layer by layer. 

In this reflection, the poem imagines the journey of a rock:

• From igneous birth (fire, magma)
• Through erosion and deposition forming sediments
• Fossils and stories captured in layers
• Compressed and heated, becoming metamorphic

It reminds us that everything around us — the mountains, the tiles in halls, the marble statues — had beginnings that stretched across millions of years, shaped by substances and forces far beyond human life spans.

📚 Source: Britannica. (2024). Sedimentary environments.