Stars’ dust at forty-five

I am just a speck of dust
Turning in the light.
I mean that in the least modest of ways.
Not: I am so insignificant as to be next to nothing.

I am no chore to be wiped away,
Nor an allergen.
My illusions of grandeur
allude directly to the power
— for I’ve got the power! —
of me as a diminutive fleck.

That sliver of sunlight?
That panel of particles parting the curtains,
releasing you from your device
long enough to fill you with wist,
with wish and wonder?

That’s me, not in the corner,
But in the middle of your room.
That’s me in the span of light
Tumbling and turning with grace to never land,
A sort of slip-sliding away.

And here I am choosing my religion.
Not for fame,
But for the reasons that fame exists.

Let’s face it: we are stardust.
And this is the garden.
The east, north, west and the south of it.
While others are waiting for the eggman
(Goo goo g’joob)
You will choose your confessions
As we all do.
And I as that speck, that fleck,
I say the word so you’ll be free.

I told you: there is no modesty here.
(Photons bouncing off busted bits of the galaxy,
they don’t go for heavy labels.)

I am just a speck of dust
Turning in delight.

(From time to time a poem pops out. Usually it’s silly rhyming snippets via WhatsApp to unsuspecting friends in other time zones. But this one snuck out of me as my birthday promises to drag me permanently out of forty-fiveness. Somehow leaving 45 reminds me of 45s, the 1970s, the songs, the songs that begat other songs, and stuff like that.)

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