Plastered leaves of tree branches, into homes formed
Dangling free, lulled to silent surrender, the denizens
Red weaver ants, building ever more homes, housing
multiple workers, defenders, mating pairs, the royals
All in service of their mothers, egg laying progenitors
Their young: eggs, larvae, pupae, safely tucked inside,
generations anew to fuel nature's cycles of life, growth.
Tree kingdoms of multiplying homes spread to the sky
As backdrop, highrise dwellings of the human race
That rise upon land in possession of land grabbers
Putting high price on dwellings, so like the ant’s home,
security in luxury within holes of a concrete rectangle.
Units of unit families severed from community’s reach
willingly set in isolation, complacent with life’s journey
in limited service to society, as one within the masses
with a great caution not to leave any dent in the polish
of the decadent status quo reeling from a vitriolic blitz,
unseen to them, the harbinger of ecosystem collapse.
Excepting the human, all nature's denizens seeing this
For one the weaver ants in adopting urban park trees
artificially grown amidst a concrete jungle, offer service
to Booma Devi whose mercy undivided for friend/foe
not denied even for builders of concrete monstrosities.
In offering a symbiotic hand the weaver ants’ kingdom.
The Oecophyllini tribe’s warriors with pincers, acid spray
combat tree pests and all that dare disrupt their kingdom
that keeps in order the park's ecosystem as a city oasis.
Hopes ardently this poet that no ignorant urban planner
on prodding of myrmecophobic condominium dwellers
disrupt the weaver ants’ service towards Booma Devi.
