Brian’sPoems

The Collected Writings of Brian J. Mueller

A single poem, met at the right moment, can change a life.

Search and read all 1,834 pieces by Brian J. Mueller — 1,675 poems, 38 prose pieces, and 121 haiku from 12 published volumes. Free to read and share.

Search tips

Search by title, first line, poem text, book, or type — results appear as you type. Look inside the poems for any word or line, or wrap a phrase in "quotes" to find it exactly. Use the chips and the book menu to narrow things down.

← All poems

Crawly Things

At last I can see and hear those spirits

I should have trusted all along!
I just killed an ant
right beside my chair.
But don’t worry,
there are many more.
All around us live
some unseen millions
of tiny crawly things.

Wise voices assure me
these ants and spiders
now wrinkling my brow
and giving me the shivers
may be something more
than they appear to be.

I suppose nothing crawling
could ever fear the soil.
And as I’ve learned to live with fire
by being gentle with fire,
I may learn to love this Earth
by accepting everything
which comes from Earth.

Published in