Dance of the Water Striders
On a spontaneous impulse —
To traipse through the woods, just before dusk adjusts to sunset —
I head out, taking nothing with me
But the warm clothing in which I'm dressed
And a sense of reverence, ecstasy, the essence of revelation.
My psyche is primed to encounter lichen, fungi, moss,
Chipmunks, skunks, red, gray, and black squirrels,
Join shadows with throaty crows pecking at carcass garbage,
Ducks plucking sustenance from the lake's shallows,
Leaves, crimson and gold, fleeing maples, on fall's spastic blasts.
After an hour and a half, I return to the camp's back gate,
Take some four hundred paces to my warm cabin,
But not before stepping out onto the yet-intact fishing dock,
Coming eye to eye with nature's necessary choreography,
September's complex dance steps —
Balletic water striders, etching, in their frenetic wakes,
Exquisitely intricate zigzags, spirals, interweaving ripples,
For infinitely brief lifetimes, prior to being eaten alive
By surfacing-in-a-blur fish surfeiting their mindless appetites,
In a world where beauty belies impersonal mercilessness.
09/22/10 - (4)
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