Dandelions

Dandelions are taproots that bring nutrients 
up to restore depleted soils.
Possums kill the ticks that would otherwise spread
disease to our fragile bodies.
Snakes have borne their bad rap since Biblical times
but without them we'd be plagued by locusts. 

Look closely enough and the individual begins
to disappear. We are not unique and entire. We are teeming
microbiomes tethered and held in the gentle
cradle of the world by an invasion at the cellular level.
The vain talk of space colonies, as though we simply live on earth, 
as though we are not part of it, as though we are not bound
by fungal threads and the chemicals of breath and 
every ghost that whispers through our DNA.

Wash your hands and destroy a galaxy of bacteria. 
Drink kombucha and bring another into being.
There is no dividing line between the living and the dead 
in this world where we are both all of the time.

How much else have we misunderstood, as we claimed
dominion over all the earth?