Eating Wasps
Pre-apocalypse, things take on a certain radiance
our eye the dystopian lens lingering on death: a field of corpses, say—
then resting on an amber ditch where the assassin’s flicked cigar flares red.
And now I’m eating wasps. Did you know that figs are full of dead ones?
Not really. In any given fruit there’s one at most
who, pollinating, died within. If there at all they’re reabsorbed, digested by the enzyme,
replaced with pulp or a hundred glinting pips. Think of that next time you wake at three to the abyss.
It’s not the worst thing. You knew (right?) about the aphids in cabbage, thrips in the corn, all the mites
that grace gray sage, eagwig bits in our coffee, one hundred & some parts allowed per pound—
Oh well.
There’s something to be said for acquiescence:
the calm…
You're reading a preview of
The American Poetry Review (Digital) - 1 Issue, January/February 2021