At Six and Seven

They sqatted on their hells, these children six and seven,

studying a dead bird baby, fallen half-fledged

from its next high-hidden in the sturdy pine.

Long they sat there, fascinated as the ants purseued

their wonted task, re-cycling the forlorn body

of the baby bird who too soon ventured from the nest.

Long they squatted there, absorbing Nature’s lesson grim and sad.

Then one took a leaf and brushed the ants away. The other

did the same; thought had given way to action.

Was it some wish that magic might undo the tragedy that

Nature’s hand had wrought? Or was it reverence

for what had been, and for what might have been, if only…

Sympathy, no doubt; perhaps a sense of awe; some inkling

of what fate holds in store for all of us. It is thus we learn,

at six or seven, about the mystery of death.