While I think you met the challenge here..I think you need to slow up, spend more time with focus, light and composition. This is rocks on the ground..! That will not make the viewer care, or have any emotion or..any interest. Take your time, steady your camera on a tripod, fence, chair, table..take 50 shots and then try it again with different light, different perspective. Good luck.
Personally I do like this photo. I feel like I see the same beauty in this photo that you do.... One idea that might have helped this finish higher would have been to crop it in tighter so that the other non-granular elements were not in the photo. It would be more abstract but it would have left you with a better composition.
I think of all the images you have included the highest number or granular substances. It is an extreamly hard task to do that many different substances without the photo looking cluttery. I think the problem that most people will have with this image will be the composistion.
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