I could never decide what I was like,

in the face of

9,000,000,000 species and

 

3,000,000,000 stars and

7,000,000,000 people,

most of whom I will never speak to,

none of whom will I ever fully comprehend.

 

I crept around it all,

soft on my feet, stepping through dust,

wary of stirring the world’s sleep.

 

Every step I took was foreign, strange,

unsettling,

so I became content with

standing still.

 

But I had a dream last night

that I was floating in a dark, starless sky,

glowing,

 

looking down on gleaming city veins

and sculpted ocean waters.

I could see every magnificent

combination of atoms on Earth.

 

Now I know what I am like.

I am as beautiful and significant as

9,000,000,000 species and

 

3,000,000,000 stars and

7,000,000,000 people

and all their suffering, hunger,

love, worry, fear, and joy.

 

I slip into the world’s bed of

warm laughter and lullabies in 6,500 languages

and I find a place for myself at last,

for in the end, we are all made from the same glorious dust.