Pantala flavescens
Marie Gauthier
Day’s close—August’s ineluctable heat
avows rain, relief. Above the new-mown
meadow, an aria of wings:
the swarm strafes gold.
The swooping orbits catch an updraft—
fluted notes lift, then veer back again.
Forethought, foregone, dragonflies skim
air like fingers on glass, elocutions that shimmer
and rustle, yield and return,
the tablature in ceaseless shift.
Obbligato: mosquito-static, whine—
those raconteurs of zing lead
night’s overture, second strings plucked
mid-air and mouthed, off-key.
Desire glides along broken chords, death
but one octave below.
Art by Evie Lovett
Marie Gauthier, Director of Sales & Marketing of Tupelo Press, is the author of a chapbook, HUNGER ALL INSIDE (Finishing Line Press, 2009). Recent poems can be read or are forthcoming in The Common, Cave Wall, Salamander, Poetry Northwest, and elsewhere.
Marie Gauthier
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