| poet | Robert Frost, American |
| first published | 1939; collected in A Witness Tree (1942) |
| setting | a writer's desk; a sheet of paper with wet ink |
| what the speaker is doing | writing |
| first thought about the speck | a dust particle |
| what it really is | a living mite |
| signs of intelligence | pausing, racing, loathing the ink, running, creeping, faltering, cowering |
| deduction | it must have had feet |
| first impulse | to stop it with his pen |
| decision | let it lie there till it slept |
| reason | respect for intelligent life — he recognises a mind |
| tone | philosophical / reflective / meditative, with humour |