Hadean Eclogue

A Precambrian Pastoral

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To mark the occasion, I will share a longer poem.

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Artist’s impression of the Hadean Earth. Source: Wikimedia Commons. The image has been cropped.

Introductory Note: The Hadean eon is the first geological eon of Earth’s history, spanning from the formation of Earth at about 4.6 billion years ago to the age of the earliest dated rock formations at 4 billion years ago.

I owe the title and inspiration for the poem to Frederick Turner, whose Hadean Eclogues (Story Line Press, Ashland, OR, 1999) are named in reference to the Classical underworld rather than the primeval Earth.

The poem presented here is a celebration of the earliest era in Earth’s history (and of the history of life, which may have had its beginnings late in the Hadean). To that end, it makes playful use of the conventions of Pastoral poetry and Greek mythology.

Read it aloud. Let it be bombastic and ridiculous — but I hope that its lyricism, its archaism, and its detailed imagery will help transport you into the strange and terrible world of the primeval Earth.

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Lava flowing into the sea from a Hawaiian volcano. Source: Wikimedia Commons, U.S. National Park Service.

HADEAN ECLOGUE

At times I have retreated to the past
(In thought, of course) — to eons long remote —
And looked upon the pastures, drear and vast,
Which never knew the hoof of sheep or goat.
But secret flocks are fed there, though the flames 
Burn all about, in streams and springs of fire,
And though that place can hold no shepherd-swains
To take up song, or play upon the lyre.

Such times I made a phantom of myself
And lightly stepped upon the burning marl.
I found a spot upon a coastal shelf
(No vines entangle there, no thorns ensnarl) —
And sat to view my flocks, as from the sky
Come meteors which fall like flashing rain 
To shatter isles, or make the waters fry,
Across the ever-roaring ocean plain.

But in the foaming pools, and in the depths 
Where blood-red magma seeps into the sea,
There feed my flocks, and there I take my steps
With crook in hand, and shepherd-minstrelsy.
On methane and sulphuric gas they feast, 
They pasture on the elemental earth
Which cannot yet bear grass or grazing beast
In this first eon since her fiery birth.

Invisible to ordinary sight —
Too minuscule for any to descry —
I see them nonetheless, and take delight
In counting them, without a reason why.
In sheer abundance, nothing can compare —
Not flocks of Gilead or Thessaly,
Nor even those the Cyclops had in care
In fields upon the isle of Sicily.

They give no meat and milk, no wool undyed —
But, then again, no labour I expend.
Though Jacob’s magic has not yet been tried
They multiply themselves without an end.
Disease and violent death are yet unknown,
No wolves or lions prey upon the herd;
And here the plaintive sigh, the lover’s moan,
Has never yet been uttered, or been heard. 

No Amaryllis dallies in the shades,
No young Naeara tends her locks of hair;
No lovers sit repining in the glades
For girls or boys they call surpassing fair;
No shepherds try to best another’s song,
No Corydon or Thyrsis seeks to win;
Nor are there nymphs and satyrs which belong
To this cruel land, to hear when they begin.

This unawakened world knows no desire:
No love, no joy, no anguish, and no grief —
Because the consciousness that these require
Is lacking, therefore also their relief.
When I survey my flocks upon the shore
Amid the flowers of pyrite and of quartz
I do not hear the young rams making war
Nor do the bleating ewes disturb my thoughts.

No shepherds make their songs in this black waste,
This world of pumice isles and basalt plains.
No lovers seek to join, with arms enlaced,
Beneath the thunder-clouds and acid rains.
This bitter atmosphere has never known
The songs of singing birds, which start and cease —
And yet my flocks prevail within this zone:
In spite of all, they flourish and increase.

Within this hell, I’ve seen a silver sun
Make all the waves like nacre, with a gleam
Which makes the new day —barely just begun —
Seem otherworldly, like a living dream.
I’ve seen volcanos spewing floods of fire
Which darkness makes a lake of liquid flame — 
And seen a world like ashes from a pyre
Survive it and recover all the same!

Thus will I tend my flocks within this place
Though it may lack for meadows, woods, and hills.
It does not have the luxury and grace
Of lawns, and groves, and fountains with their rills,
But has a savage beauty nonetheless
And innocence of sin and of despair —
Sometimes it even seems, I must confess,
Arcadia itself cannot compare.

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Thank you for reading.

© Metrical Poet, 2025.