My Word of the Month poem

Hi everyone,

A couple of days ago Sandy and I enjoyed a return visit to Eden Gardens. I came out, as one sometimes does, with the idea for a poem. Here is my bravo-inspired contribution for February.

A Speck on a Table

We strolled around the antebellum mansion,
meandered the long, shady lawn
toward the water, coming eventually
to a picnic table with a view of the bayou.
There we rested on a bench to watch
some gulls glide around the water.
.
Glancing down at the weathered tabletop,
I noticed a small black spot.
Without my glasses, I couldn’t tell
if it was a miniscule bug or just a fleck
of something carried there on the wind.

I looked out again at what we came to see –
gulls and now two pelicans, skimming the surface –
but drawn by the dot, I looked back down.
It was not in the same place.

Could this thing fly? Did it hop three inches?
Could it mate with others of its kind,
lay eggs too small to see without a microscope?
Or was it just a speck of matter
breathed on the breeze across the top of the table?

Going home in the car, we talked briefly
about the mansion and its sphagnum-haunted trees.
But neither they nor the birds or leaping fish
had captured me as much 
as that speck on the picnic table.
The unknowable dot sent me away
with a memory worth pondering.
Bravo, dot.

© 2025 David L. Harrison, all rights reserved