An ultra-rare mineral known as reidite was found deep within the long-buried Woodleigh Crater near Shark Bay, approximately 750 kilometers north of Perth, Western Australia. Reidite is only formed under the extreme pressure created when rocks from outer space slam into the Earth’s crust. It is only the sixth time the mineral has been discovered on Earth.
cratered fast
for a body
that spent
a billion years
finding a home
punched a hole
straight through
plasterboard
in anger.
comet or
meteorite
the length
of a good
saturday park run
or if the science
is fit,
run twice
that distance.
crater
drive from
brisbane to
the sunshine coast
or in wa
drive from
perth to
the margaret river
just for
the minerals
in its wine.
reefs bleached
in an instant
photographed
by the impact’s
magnesium flare
smile it said
you blinked
first compound eyes
simultaneously blinded
day of the triffids
eye stalks
as spent matches
brachiopods sizzled
in the indian ocean’s
seafood restaurant
trilobites
bit off more
than they could chew
bit the dust.
dumped bitcoin
of the devonian past.
reidite
a pin-prick
of blood on
zircon’s thumb
rarefaction wave
shook out
shark bay
like a crustal
city-sized rug
gneiss genesis
gnostic.
only six
times ever
been a ‘thing’
on earth
chesapeake bay
ries
xiuyan
woodleigh
rock elm
dhala
rarefied company
rarer than
diamonds, gold
all evidence
of existence
fits under
a fingernail.
earth science
teachers don’t
know of it
as cordite
to a gun’s damage
entrance wound
residue around
puckered skin
or artillery
shrapnel that
mines deep
beside the aorta
extinction event’s
ectoplasm.
in that hot box
of energy
two bodies radiate
in the instant
before contact
not a ‘thing’ at all
but
in that split second
of a magician’s trick
when the eye has
not yet caught on
to the new
position of the coin.
reidite is born.
