Poetry: A Written Diorama of the Florida Geological Scene
Out of the Sandbox May 8, 2019By Tiffiny Rose Allen
Florida, the land where I was born.
Never really thought much about where I grew up,
Never really thought about how the rocks formed even though I always admired them.
I used to just accept them as they were,
Until I learned.
Over 160 million years ago…
Florida used to be a part of Africa
Used to be a part of the bigger picture, Pangea.
Lava rocks and sedimentary, sea levels rising, sea levels lowering,
Our beaches and our waters containing minerals we never knew of before.
Today is the day we learn.
Limestone sits below Florida’s belt, holding it up, tearing it down,
Appearing as chalk
Shuffling in fossils of the marine life,
Gaining such notoriety by the variety that the limestone shelters.
All of that about 160 million years ago and onwards.
Caves and sinkholes make themselves known,
Much like a cavity once it’s been hollowed through,
The limestone disintegrates creating the hole
Of a trademark—karstification
Much like
The Florida outline.
Sand, silt, and clay,
Molded and folded away
To perform the presentation of the manifestation of what we know as The State’s unique form.
Quartz sand flowing through the water but the water not flowing through it,
A million and 23 keeping the Florida aquifer in check, age of the siliciclastic,
Still going today, my that’s just fantastic.
Sea level change
Big steps, big ingredients still occurring today,
Making up the Florida bay,
Low here, low there, performing a geographic spread to the naked eye.
Today’s report can pray tell
That one day Florida might return to the water from back in the day.
Early Pliocene, tell me what you mean
The bridge was there it connected the south and north of the planes, creatures big and small would make the crawl to another life;
Much like the humans do when they escape the mundane lifestyle and return to the beach,
Containing such history right in front of our eyes, sending us clues so that we will look—diorama.
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