The speaker talks with the land and finds it wise in a particular way: it says little. The title, "Geomancy," points to an old idea of reading the earth for meaning, and the poem keeps that sense of quiet attention. The land seems to listen and hold still while everything around it moves.
The change comes in the last lines, which read like a chain: ore becomes money, money becomes profit, and the afternoon becomes paper. Each step takes something real and turns it into something more abstract. The final image is the sharpest. Even a stretch of time is used up and turned into paperwork. The poem never says outright that this is a loss, but the speaker's calm respect for the land, set against that list, suggests a quiet unease. The mood is reflective and a little melancholy. The land's silence feels like wisdom, while human activity feels busy and thinning out.