by Jason Twinhaft

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***I was going to write an interrogatory, creating a string of hectoring, incriminating questions along the lines of:

Does it most become an ant to…
   …rouse young ants to war, and old ants to support them?
   …sell the face and bosom DNA has made it heir to?
   …believe its god is the god of all ants?
   …convince poor ants they’re buying cheese when all you’re selling
       is the silver paper?
   …study the lovely but shallow surface of reality and call it the pursuit
       of scientific truth?
   …put a mirror to ant shit and call it art?

designed to lead the reader to see that—as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be—all is vanity, vanity is all.

As I prepared to set to, I realized that those few ants with working ant ears have already heard or will soon figure out how to hear for themselves, and those many ants without working ant ears won’t hear, no matter how clever my questions.