They Know the Way Back

A tern the size of your hand takes off from the top of the world Flies to the bottom and back, the longest route ever unfurled Do that every year for the whole of a life And you've out-flown the Moon, there and back, more than twice

Following a map nobody taught it, again and again

They know the way back, further than we'd believe They know the way back, reading a sky we can't perceive The push of the Earth's own magnet, a smell held in the wind The angle of the sun at dusk, the map is hidden within

The whale sings the same route through an ocean with no lines Passing the song to her calf like a story, generation to generation, and it stays inside A pattern learned before birth, or maybe older than learning goes A memory in the muscle that the whole species somehow knows

They know the way back, further than we'd believe They know the way back, reading a sky we can't perceive Monarchs that have never made the trip before Land on the exact same trees their great-grandparents knew before

None of them has made this exact trip before No memory of last year, no photograph, no advice Passed down in words, just something folded into the wing Something the whole species carries, an ancient homing thing

They know the way back, further than we'd believe They know the way back, reading a sky we can't perceive No compass in their pocket, no chart, no GPS call Just a planet they trust completely, and they never lose it at all