Tardigrade Spirit

I dreamed My spirit guide was small enough  
to lose in a teacup,  
a creature you’d need a microscope  
and a moment of humility  
to even notice.  

It didn’t roar, or soar, or bare its teeth.  
It simply persisted;
eight stumpy legs trudging forward  
with the quiet conviction  
of something that has survived  
every ending the universe ever rehearsed.  

My tardigrade teacher showed Me  
how strength can be soft-bodied,  
how courage can look like  
curling inward at the right time,  
how disappearing into stillness  
is sometimes the most radical way  
to stay alive.  

It taught Me that resilience  
isn’t a battle cry;
it’s a slow, stubborn heartbeat  
that refuses to stop  
even when the world forgets  
to be gentle.  

When I asked it for wisdom,  
it didn’t speak.  
It simply floated,  
suspended in its own tiny cosmos,  
a reminder that survival  
is its own kind of holiness.  

And now, when life scorches,  
or freezes,  
or empties itself into a vacuum,  
I feel that microscopic guardian  
trudging on inside Me;
a quiet insistence  
that I, too, can endure  
what should have unmade Me.  

My spirit animal is a tardigrade:  
humble, unkillable,  
a creature that carries  
the whole philosophy of persistence  
in a body smaller than a grain of dust.  

And somehow,  
that makes Me feel vast.