Walk carefully so you don't step on ants
A grandmother told her grandson.
And the grandson did, but he grew
And his head became further from the ground
And the plight of ants seldom troubled him,
Though, in fairness, sometimes it still did.
They are not special, his textbooks implored,
And his professors confirmed
And his girlfriend wanted his attention
As did his friends and his bosses
And he grew to learn that he was not special either,
Not to strangers
Nor passing comets
Nor the impersonal forces of the universe
But to those who stopped to notice him
He meant at least a little or some
And from that he prospered and grew older still
And when he watched his granddaughter play
He told her
Walk carefully so you don't step on ants
