THE ANT RACE
Busy, busy little ants
racing round my patio,
missing poles and dodging plants
as though controlled by radio.
But these mighty insect midgets,
while boosting their ecology
spurn all those magic widgets
created by technology.
Like birds on their migratory wings,
they navigate by wondrous instinct,
keeping formation, avoiding pings
however narrow is their precinct.
Their traffic flow across my yard,
dense in scale as any freeway,
is orderly and never marred
by prangs requiring towaway.
There they scurry in single files,
marching with regimental zeal,
criss-crossing pavings, skirting tiles,
heading home for the evening meal.
- Bill Guy, Adelaide, January 2009
Seven consecutive days of 40C-plus heat in Adelaide last week were not conducive to the writing of serious poetry (although South Australia would have made the ideal setting for Dante's Inferno). I, therefore, indulged myself in the above little frolic as my contribution to the latest session of the Aldinga group on the theme of Insects. Warmest (!) wishes to all my highly creative ExStanza colleagues.
1 comment:
Cantankerous little mites and so cheerfully described. I can see them, all beavering away at their allotted tasks without as much a glance in any other direction but that on which they are focused.
Couplets do the work of the poem so well, just like the ants, both lines and legs ferreting in and about the job of getting to the end of the day without loosing a second in effort.
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