The Aphid in the Spruce

In a deep, jagged crevice
on the rough skin of a Sitka spruce,
a tiny aphid lives and dies:

Every day the aphid takes the same journey.
Under that branch, across those leaves,
over the rough indents in the bark.
Every day he does this and is so proud,
so proud of how far he has gone
and all that he has done.
He did not know that he wasn’t going anywhere.
He did not know that he was, in fact,
walking in place.

Is it yesterday or tomorrow? the aphid would wonder.
Have I just started living, or have I just started dying?

No one will know how the aphid felt,
what he ate and when he slept,
what he saw and what he heard.
They won’t know about the
cold winters he barely survived or
the infinite joy he felt when
the warm rays of summer
shone down on his tiny body.

How every morning he’d wake up, certain,
that change — good change — would come his way.
And every night, he’d return to his crevice,
certain there was nothing more than this.

Just wait, the air would whisper.
Be patient, the bees would hum.
Whatever will come, will come.
And so all the aphid did was wait.

At one point, though you wouldn’t know,
the aphid had his longest, most profound thought,
that so happened to be the dismal truth of his existence:

After something is gone forever
the only thing that makes its life real
is if it is remembered.

And by now you’re asking the same questions
that everyone asks.

Does it make any difference to know the aphid’s story?
The answer is probably not.

Well, what could you or I do for the aphid?
The answer is probably nothing.

The deep, jagged crevice is now empty,
but anyone that’d notice would think
it had always been that way.

Then you say it all doesn’t make sense.
And you’re right — the saddest things never do.