Doubt. Toilet. Fascination. Table.

There was a time when I understood
more or less as everyone else I knew.
I wanted what we wanted. I was what
we were. Now, not so much but maybe
now, moreso maybe. Like a baby ten feet
tall, wrestling atoms - "Please stay!"

The world and I think of ants and how
for some few there is enough about them
to interest us though the news is bad.
These ants, you see, are made of fire
and they are burning legs of dogs and
folks like us. How would we feel?
How do we feel? Lost in a sea of
ants. Swarming with flame. Eaten alive.
So that we become ants. What was
us now incorporated into ants.

Not the soul, some voice clambers loudly
with hammers bang bang not the soul!
The conviction strident beyond rumor
crusted over with religion and what mom said.
Shh. A hiss. The look.
I'm too afraid not to believe.
All seems reasonable, really, until you ask.
Until the snake comes whispering
questions mom did not want to hear
emerge from my lips. It's all dangerous.
Atoms especially and their silly children

And out there already (not now)
I am not doing this work, instead I'm
mouldering back into separate particles,
disseminating out into the world because
one day I knew what to do and began.