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Thomson / Gale

Standing still in insect season

Christian Century,  August 8, 2006  by Jean Keskulla

Standing still in insect season

   When it touches you, you will keep still,
   in spite of black flies hovering--
   fiercely itching, lumpish red spots to come--
   feeling the day lighten, half-laughing
   at yourself, you look so silly

   with a butterfly on your arm.
   Flawless wings open--orange, deep-brown--
   and close to make one dead leaf,
   on each side a tiny silver sickle,
   moonsliver, which gives it the name,

   Comma. Knobbed antennas in front
   like turned-around exclamation marks.
   Meaning, in the Beginning, when butterflies
   were made, for the first time the Word
   needed a speck of punctuation.

COPYRIGHT 2006 The Christian Century Foundation
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning