Repeated Opression - A Tradition Poem by RIC BASTASA

a bird in the sky
looks upon the sickness of
the ant

poor ant it has worked so
hard
and does not own even the
sand
of the anthill
empire

when the ant dies another
ant
shall replace it
stronger
and dumber


the chronicler tries to
justify that the life of the
ant
is the beauty of a
biography

a school of fish the bird
has eaten
its eggs upon a nest have
all hatched

another bird in the sky
looks upon the ant
which has a tradition of
sickness
which has never healed