In What Seems Small

I search for oceans vast and teeming

Or rivers running full and fast and wide.

What else could circumscribe your dreaming,

Which knows the time and course of every tide?

 

She stands, instead, beside a tree

And watches as the rain is lightly gleaming

Beneath the golden sunlight, free

From breaking clouds whose outer shells are steaming.

 

I wonder what her mind is thinking

To focus on so small a symphony.

What majesty could she be linking

With tiny beads of liquid mystery?

 

Then suddenly, I see it all

By following her eyes, whose gaze unblinking

Aligns with one about to fall,

One drop that holds the world before its sinking,

 

A lens delaying on a leaf

Before its contents splashes with the call

Of gravity, while I in disbelief

Find you reside still more in what seems small.

This poem is about the idea that even things that seem small contain infinite complexity and beauty. There's a book I read several years ago, written by the Dalai Lama, called "The Universe in a Single Atom", which looks at relationships between Buddhism and science. I think a possible alternative title for this poem could be a less extreme version of that book title - "The world in a single raindrop".