I stood beside the ocean,
And looked out to where the endless stretch of sea,
Met the churning, billowing clouds of day—
And felt smaller than a seed.

In the infinite cosmos of space,
Of galaxies and solar systems and planets a million miles away,
I am nothing in their face.
Of seven billion people, I’m just one,
Of the whole range of space, and from here to forever,
I am nothing, no one, none.

I stopped, and felt the world turn beneath my feet.
I stood rooted in place,
Helpless against the forces of the earth,
And the endless pull of space.

If you’ve never felt small, or powerless,
You’ve never stood beneath a towering tree, sat beside the sea,
Or stared across the night sky into space and saw the cold stars staring back you,
Whispering, “You are nothing next to me.”