Each night a snail gets ahold of my mail,
She reads to the extent her heart is content
She mellows and stews about daily past news
And when she is through she spews from the blues.

This fanciful snail is called Gale Ishmael,
She comes from a land full of mountains and sand
The snow comes aplenty, but never the rain,
And when she gets cold, she crawls over to Spain.
Never by foot that would be quite a toot,
But only by clinging to backpacks and tails.

Gale’s shell is made of a common bite,
She once dreamt of decorating it like a flamboyant kite,
She clung to her quest when she discovered a nest,
Full of pencils, earth’s treasures, and flowers pressed.
A little girl’s once, abandoned from time,
She rubbed against a perfect stick, the color of lime.

The shades dazzled her more than they meant to doom
Gale whisked the utensils over, under, and through,
Until she felt covered enough to cut ties
With the pencils that fell in her lap from the skies.

Now whenever Gale is out and about
She hears chirps on her frills and dredges up clout,
For not many snails have intricate scales,
She cheers to the sky while her oddities wail. 

One day she was scooting her way into town,
Her pal mantis stalked by, wearing a frown,
Said snail to mantis, “What aches you old buddy?”
Said mantis to snail, “My feet are all muddy. 
I traversed through the forest instead of the air,
My coat is filthy; other creatures, they stare.”

“Do you think they glare because they look down?”
Said the snail to the sobbing, green lad with a frown.
“From my point of view, they seek to know more,
Our skills, our strategies. Don’t underscore.
Like how did we get the patterns just right?
My friend, they are wanting to be shown the light.

Instead of drooping and walking acrook,
Think of the lessons you’ve gained from the looks,
Transfer the energy to something ahead,
Like a new set of tricks or a talk with a friend.
We all have a soul to feed and elate
It’s up to you to levitate.
Show the world you’ve got the magic,
Most of all, show yourself you have it.”

The mantis was stunned, still sad but intrigued
He’d never been told to change a darn thing. 
He thought he was fine, just floating along,
But a mantis is nothing without their true song
Not singing of course, they never crone long
But their style, profile, their deterrent from wrong.
They sit, they sway, pondering life in itself,
They bring luck, they bring wonder, they tighten their belt.

The mantis thought deeply about the snail’s words
Then he hopped on a leaf and sailed to a world
Of a not so distant future where he planted the seed
In a tree where a snail would find an imminent need
To take on the world no matter what they say,
For today is the day to go the right way.