Turbo

Turbo

I wonder if Carl Linnaeus smiled
As he coined a name for a water-snail
As if a windmill in a gale.
Perhaps the twist of its shell beguiled,
But given its lack of energy,
He must have seen the irony ?

Forever dubbed forever more
By a name befitting of cavaliers
To a bug with neither joints nor gears –
In the age of steam, as the turbines roar,
What did they think of their silent whirlwind,
Forever failing to twirl and spin ?

But maybe our Carl was being sublime ?
As cyclones on their well-greased heels,
Like plugholes, perhaps, or waterwheels,
But they did so in their own sweet time –
Forever in motion, the will that drives,
Revolving their shells throughout their lives.

Perhaps Carl was thinking of the popular hobby of snail racing ?