Ant And Elephant Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

Blanketed and roped
by midget-sized
bullet ants, it takes only
one ant to sink

the needle that sends
the big animal to find
a new home amid
wriggling stars of pain.

How a creep from specks
of dust and locks
of grassy debris shrug
themselves off heavy feet,

crawling out of narrow
spaces to stitch themselves
onto a crowned mammal
trudging on them

every day at every step,
every tilt and kick
and footslog, cutting off
hands from trunk and tusk.

(ii)

When a smoke-puffing
monarch presses
and tramps hard on
imps and dwarfs,

burning into feathers
of sun rays and fat ashes
spat out by a volcano,
watch out for embers,

these half-men from
coals split and ground
into specks of themselves,
a flame of crawling ants.