The Anthill

When I emerged from the anthill
The aloneness woke me.
I had been so immersed
In the atmosphere of the hill,
In the influence of it,
That only on standing
Outside of it
Did I discover its effect.

As I stood there
Looking down at myself
I saw with a shock
My body itself had
Been shaped by
Living so long
In the stink of the place.
I didnt really have a dick,
Not one that was my own anyway.
The hierarchy took care of that.
I was just a working class ant after all,
So I had the body for that.

Simple really I suppose.
But when you are swimming
In the mind stuff of the colony
You dont know there is anything else.
After all, my father,
And his father,
And so on backwards
For generations
Had been bred in the anthill.
Not surprising our body and mind
Were shaped by it.
So what could an individual
Ant do standing alone
Outside the hill?
After all, I was still an ant.

Well, it did seem crazy
To be told what to do
And even what to think
By the queen and king of the colony.
I could at least look around
And make up my own mind
About what was going on.
So I explored around
And saw we had been bred
To be dominated by the leaders.
Bred to believe
Certain ants had every right
To get more of the sacred nectar
Than the worker ants.

And I thought to myself,
“Hey this cant be right.
Who built this hill anyway?”
So the first thing I did
Was to make a few marks
On the walls inside the colony.
The practical reason being that
Inside the place you get lulled
Into forgetting,
And into conforming
To the old ‘Status Quo’.

So the marks were to
Keep me awake.
They also stopped a
Few other ants too.
Made them wave their
Antennae about a bit,
Wondering what
The hell it meant.

Well, anyway, it feels
Strange sometimes
Wandering around the hill
Doing my own thing.
Once you get the hang of it though,
You can easily get your needs
Without drawing much attention
To yourself.
What I want to say though,
Is that if you find yourself
In the same situation,
Wave your antennae at me.
Give me a signal.

Copyright ©2005 Tony Crisp