Ancient Wisdom Poem by Susan Gabriel

Over winter their broad bellies sank into
mud leaf beds resting on the pond's floor.
early thaws wake them prematurely and
they roam under ice, then sleep again

Heat comes, and with it memory of nests
digging and laying progeny
they will neither suckle nor wean,
but bequeath their legacy of survival

Brisk creatures have rushed past them exhausting
themselves into extinction: two-legged, four-legged,
fierce, winged, horned, finned

Them
They were stubbornly slavish to their cadence of
deliberation, as if to ask: ‘Why the hurry? '