the patient tick

….. like that tick in the tree,

for which life has nothing better to offer than perpetual hibernation.

The ugly little tick,

which by rolling its blue-gray body up into a ball offers the least possible surface to the world;

which by making its skin smooth and dense emits nothing,

lets not the tiniest bit of perspiration escape.

The tick,

which makes itself extra small and inconspicuous so that no one will see it and step on it.

The lonely tick,

which, wrapped up in itself,

huddles in its tree,

blind,

deaf,

dumb,

and simply sniffs,

sniffs all year long,

for miles around,

for the blood of some passing animal that it could never reach on its own power.

The tick could let itself drop.

It could fall to the floor of the forest and creep a millimeter or two here or there on its six tiny legs and lie down to die under the leaves-,

it would be no great loss, God knows.

But the tick,

stubborn,

sullen,

and loathsome,

huddles there and lives and waits.

Waits,

for that most improbable of chances that will bring blood,

in animal form,

directly beneath its tree. And only then does it abandon caution and drop,

and scratch

and bore

and bite into that alien flesh.

The patience of those who wait for they seek

~perfume the story of a murderer