By Callum 
Underfoot, there are sheets—silent strata of color: clay, loam, ash, sand. Each layer tells a story. One of beginning. One of leaving. One of return.
We walk on layers we do not see. Roots stretch down, seeking water in hidden seams. Worms traverse ancient tunnels. Seeds sleep in dust, waiting for light.
Above, the world glimmers: forest canopy, city glow, the sky’s shifting light. Below, everything is quiet but alive—layers compacted by time, pressed by seasons, etched by wind and water.
Sometimes we forget that the visible is built on the invisible: minerals cradling seed; fossils beneath pavement; memory buried in stone. We forget that without the underground chorus, trees would not rise, rivers would run dry, our voices would crumble.
To know a layer is to know history: of glacial ice, volcanic fire, long-vanished oceans. To honor a layer is to tread gently: for each footstep presses into the tapestry of all that came before, and all that might be to come.