With my thumb on the scale

CJC - happy Sweet Sixteen - 2025

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What is life, and why?
Questions every thinking thing has asked
since thinking first came into fashion.

And questions I ask myself
lying in fresh Summer grass
dreaming up at Summer sky.

What is big and what is small?
Or is there really no difference at all?

If there is a scale of big and little
long enough to measure
both a molecule of hydrogen and a spiral galaxy,
would that be a spring tape measure
clipped on the belt of some cosmic carpenter?

How do I differ from a fly
in that instant before my smashig hand
comes down where the fly surely was?

Yet was not and certainly is no longer,
buzzing instead around my head.

Was my furious swat so fast at all
or was it merely a lethargic breeze
in time and place of fly?

What is life and who?
Spiders and cacti, both live, we knew.
But do they know?

If so, is a spider "who", each a being
being more than merely what?

Does a spider in your bed,
in your shoe, on your head,
know you're you?

And when you're dead
do maggots morn you, miss you,
think of you by name?
Or only taste your rotting flesh?

None of those trouble me at all.
But have you looked straight in the eyes
of a goat?

Soft brown nose nuzzling,
wet pink tongue caressing,
gentle eyes meet my gaze.

Does goat wonder how I graze
when locked up in my cage at night
with noise machines and glowing lights?

Does she wonder
is my bucket filled with grasses
fresh picked green?

Or do you think a goat
Is nothing more than
kidskin gloves and cheese?

In fly's world, then,
much smaller than ours,
her magical movements become mundane
while, to her, our fierce swat
is a pace not too different
from how we see Spring carrots growing.

Consider if you please a whale,
with bus-sized body, car sized heart
nudging our vessel aside
to show her nursing calf
those noisy nosy neighbors
peering through the ceiling
of her watery apartment.

What should I say?
"Excuse me, please. So sorry to intrude.
Just thought I'd drop in."
And she may indeed excuse,
coming closer for a rub.

Or not!
One casual wave of dismissal
with a tail like twin Turkish wrestlers
tips my boat, spills my bait,
and reminds me that
it's not the fly that's small.

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