1
Drawn to the sun-coaxed scent of joe-pye weed,
bees and a monarch butterfly browse and
probe.
Below, beside the shadow of a weed head,
a strange cicada creeps across a flat stone.
The smooth head, with its green glistening eyes;
then the thorax, that busy band of function;
and mounted on it, legs and lacy wings,
with their fine, sharp, intricate veins.
But beneath those clear windows, nothing.
The abdomen, bearer of all the reasons—
the heavy cargo of eggs, the ovipositor—
missing; under the veins, only rock.
An error of growth, perhaps, or
a succulent meal for a bird.
2
Years ago, in Missouri, my toddler son and I
marveled at thousands of red-eyed cicadas,
on every tree, covering the sidewalk, on the roof,
an oatmeal can-full to evict from the fireplace each morning.
After sunrise, the noise was a deafening pulse,
with cicadas flying off the trees at the height of noise,
then back on, as if the trees were breathing.
Looking closely, kneeling on the perforated ground,
we saw bewildering variety. Among the perfect specimens,
all possible malformations: stunted wings—or none—
yellow eyes, no eyes, miniature heads, missing legs,
twisted bodies. I don’t recall any missing abdomens;
maybe that requires an intervention.
Several hatches occurred that year.
At a farm pond outside of town, we could see
that fish were grabbing the ones that fell in.
So we baited our hooks with cicadas,
and we did quite well.
In the aftermath, trees showered branch tips,
ripped at the broken ends, and inside the splits, white eggs,
bound for deeper earth, thirteen years of silence.
3
Once, in this Maine garden, I held a new cicada,
watched it crawl across the back of my hand.
Then I lifted it delicately, launched it gently.
A jay straight overhead, hushed,
stepped off its branch, twisted downward,
plucked the cicada out of the air.
A quiet krrriikk, then silence
but for a rustle of blue wings
mere inches above my eyes.
Now I wonder. Which parts did she discard,
which did she eat or feed to nestlings?
1
This fruitless cicada crawls on, to the edge of the stone,
a launchpad for a sterile mission. No broken tree tips.
No white eggs.
His eye is on the sparrow, the hymn says.
On the insect, no comment.
Bees and a monarch browse and probe the sunny heads.
Gale Rhodes
