the surface cracked,
the grass that sprouts
there briefly green
before it withers
to gold. A caravan
of ants harvests
the seeds that have
fallen into the cracks.
They don’t see the
guided bomb that falls
upon the power plant.
Dust and ash tints
their backs from black
to sooty gray.
The thud of the
explosion knocks
the grains of wild rye
and barley from their jaws
and collapses the tunnels
and corridors of their
carefully constructed
sand palace underneath
the cobbles of the road.
They just resume
their tasks of moving
grains of sand and seeds.
By sundown, the passages
and storerooms have been
repaired, their cargo stowed.
Two people walk along
the road discussing what
has happened, what
they have seen and heard,
fearful of the noise and heat
and the promised peace
that hasn’t closed the breach
between prophesy and what the
powerful call “facts on the ground.”
A stranger joins them and
points out the ants, the facts
that persist underground.
The lowly ones don’t ask,
they shake off the dust,
continue their tasks.
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