Petrichor


Chip’s Note: Jeff is our company poet, but also an expert in the art of living and noticing. I snuck this fresh-off-the-presses poem in here because I couldn’t hold it back.

“Sur l’odeur propre de la terre”

The day my daughter asked me

If there was a name for the smell after rain

I caught my breath

As, in that instant,

She became the kind of person

Who notices the smell of the earth

After it rains

Petra from stone

Like the dry bones of the earth

That live hot and hard

Here in the Baja desert

Ichor

From the golden blood of gods.

Petrichor

The smell of gods blood

On the earth

(I know that feeling on my own bones)

This is a word forged in a furnace

The science of geosmin or

‘Earth smell’

As oils and soils breathe

And the vivid relief

After a first rain

Bring longing and life

Finally together

There is a tart joy

When a nine year old

Lights up to her self

And senses into the world

As it breathes

As its blood moves

And, best of all

The dorksome* joy

Of a new

Favorite word

For Isabel Joy Bear

Who invented the word Petrichor

*Dorksome. Awesomeness for dorks

Jeff Hamaoui is a co-founder of MEA and Regen Communities, the Chief Education and Innovation Officer and an entrepreneur, sage, wit, and poet.

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