Small Is Relative (Saturday Writing Essential)

"Hey, Chandar, what’s that you have?”

The hunter turned and pointed at his captive. “It’s an elephant.”

The blank look from his chief told him that he had to add some explanation. “It’s an animal of the African plains and it’s called an elephant.”

Aldrod, the chief, stood there staring a moment, and then his face split into a grin. “Ah, you’re having fun with me, huh, Chandar?” He turned and waved at the rest of the tribe and shouted, “Chandar is having fun with us.”

The tribe stood there for only a moment before they laughed, somewhat restrained because they weren’t certain what the chief wanted them to do.

Chandar stood there, looking at the chief, then the tribesmen, then back at his captive. He refocused his look on the chief and said, “No, Great One, I have captured and brought back this great animal so that you could see for yourself what our enemy has domesticated.”

Aldrod stared at the tiny animal and said, “That is no bigger than the smallest ratosol found in our homes. How could that race domesticate something so small?”

Chandar chuckled and said, “Great One, you will not believe this, but this creature is one of the largest on that world.” His announcement was met with… wonder… disbelief… and those that figured he had smoked too much of the “wacky tobacky” he had already brought back from that screwy planet.

The chief listened to several of the advisors who said Chandar was crazy and then made his pronouncement: “If these people domesticate such small animals, we shall watch them to see if they advance beyond that level of intelligence. Until then, we have bigger planets to survey.”

* * *

Challenge: Start out with something you’ve found that’s rather small. It can be a rock, an ant, anything your heart desires. Write a poem, short, story, an essay, about this object. Make sure that you write at least 200 words, if it’s a story, or essay. If it’s a poem, make it at least 30 lines.

Angela cautioned us NOT to use an elephant in our story and to put in some kind of twist. I can’t help being me so I had to do both of those.

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