Picture a gnome with its philosophical, sedentary way
of going about life. Sitting on a mushroom all day.
They sit there all day lines dangling in the stream.
One catch a week is all they require it would seem.
Small fish of course, the larger ones they have to set free.
They can’t waste the energy so they let the larger ones be.

Pixies, hyper and pushy occupy the opposite niche.
Few fish can defy the fury they unleash.
They charge into the water and fight
for the fish that they fancy tonight.
The smaller fish they ignore by default,
supplying less energy than used in the assault.

It is a good day for one gnome as it winds in its reel
on the other end of the line is a fish, a week lasting meal.
Another though, with no bite for a week, keels over and dies.
Its only role now is to provide a meal for the worms and the flies.

One pack of pixies has captured a prize
landing a fish that’s ten times their size.
Another though chooses the wrong shoal.
The luckless ones drown. The rest swallowed whole.

For one life is something that happens along.
One, life happens, blink and it’s gone.
Either way, life goes on.