A fish sat in his little bowl.
And suddenly another appeared.
‘I have discovered a water hole,’
He said, with an element of cheer.

‘I already have water all around’
Said the first, as he gave a twirl in his tank.
‘But you don’t understand the sound,’
Said the second, ‘this water makes on its bank.’

‘I don’t know what a bank is,’ said the first.
‘Well, that’s because you have never seen
The great water that is filled to burst,’
(spoke the second) that men call the ocean.’

The first replied, ‘With water all around, why should I look for more?
And besides if everything’s water, then nothing’s water. It all splatters.
I don’t even really know what water is, or this thing you call a shore.
What’s water to a fish? It’s like air to a man, molecules to matter.’

He continued his speech: ‘I don’t need your ocean, friend.
I’m surrounded by water on every side.
I have enough to keep me busy and tend
In my tank until the day that I die.’

And die he did, inundated by liquid
All around in his little pen.
To him, water was water, but for his friend it was another matter,
So he went to the ocean to swim.

‘Didn’t the second die as well?’ you ask.
Of course he did, and so will we.
Yet he died not in a cask,
But in the freedom of the sea.