Classic Poem

Insects' little digital lives per-
sist in confounding us. Closer
in size to the quantum or
to the " cosmic particle " , they'd
as soon buzz through as around us,
making no bones of us
so to speak; and, whether they're blind
as the sowbug, say, or Argus-
eyed as the jumping-spider,
don't register our importance —
and persist so in their folly
it must be wisdom by this time
(applying Blake's law) . . . . Unless
it was always wisdom, that
absolute certainty bugs
possess, even in the egg,
as to What Must Be Done.

(What respectable June-bug
would omit to un-nerve you
banging his head on your screen
half a summer night, or shad-
fly to be in-your-face —
indeed, drown in your eye?)

Being mostly mineral,
maybe they're miniature
long-since-perfected trans-
istorized nuclear resonance
magnetic field folk! ...
But I can't help you — couldn't
help even my little daughter
whose entomological debut was:
" Daddy, are hornets' legs
bones or strings? "