Killing Ants

 

The trails of ants make their advance in the kitchen.

They come in black swarms, are spreading all over,

To the jar of honey, the wilted peach,

the crumbs of bread on the counter.

I crush them one by one under my thumb,

Slice their broken carcasses between my finger nails,

And drop them into the trails down below.

I watch them scurry in panic,

Like people in those movies where the buildings come crumbling down all around them.

In their stubborn nobility, the living carry off

the corpses of the dead.

Rolled and broken by a hand from high above, they keep falling.

I watch them for a time, and then wash them all off—all of them,

The living and the dead alike,

With a deluge of soap and water.

I watch their limbs squirm in the froth.

 

I frown a little, feeling sorry.

But it was a little funny how seriously they panicked,

And ran from me like they could ever get away.

 

I wonder: Is this how God feels?