Snails

Few days back I saw many snails that had been awakened by the first rains. All moving dreamily making way to their respective single leafed territories, crisscrossing one another, leaving behind silver trails and gently bowing and touching each other with their fleshy antennae, as if following some snail etiquettes. The more polite ones, stopping completely, withdrawing themselves and moving only when the other snail had moved away, sometimes even over them. Being much higher I could see the whole of this newly revealed snail-city with leaves, glass bottles, flies, plants, trees, grass, water puddles and snails, all maneuvering around this moist geography for food and water. The shelter was not a problem, as all were well equipped with huge spirals (made out of some mathematical golden triangles as observed by many important mathematicians), where calcium met tissue, stone and organism fused together to give rise to soft green snail living in an exquisitely designed shell with autobiographical patterns that told stories of changing weather patterns, water availability and snail moods; everyday carefully recorded as a single line of calcium deposit. The dead shells were usually inherited by a very needful crab, insect, fish or a kid. Some more determined ones stayed buried among the sediments, so as to leave behind an imprint of their magnificent fast paced life for a distant future to rediscover their ghosts in coal.