Interconnectedness

Oftentimes I wonder how life

Would be if a single event from the past

Had been different or hadn't occurred.

My whole life would have been recast.

 

All that's happened--right or wrong,

Wanted or not, good or bad,

Planned and expected or coincidental,

High or low, happy or sad--

 

Would be different. But would life be

Better or worse? If either, how so?

I can speculate all I want,

But that is something I'll never know.

 

Whether I take the road less traveled

Or whether I follow the beaten path,

Decisions I make are sometimes fruitful;

When not, I deal with the aftermath.

 

If certain causes and conditions,

Whether they were big or small,

Had been even slightly different,

I might not be here at all.

 

All it takes is a butterfly

In the Amazons to flap its wings,

And that--some people say--will have

An effect on countless other things.

 

Go to the beach and walk away

With just one grain of sand. No more.

Although it's imperceptible,

The shore now is a different shore.

 

Everything is interconnected

In ways too subtle to understand--

From giant, spinning galaxies

To the tiniest grain of sand.

-by Bob B (12-12-21)