painted poem #18/21

June Bugs

As a child you found what was left of them—exoskeletons clinging to the bark of trees. Perfect as anything. Perfect fit for a child’s hand. Perfectly empty, perfectly whole. Bodies so effortlessly slipped from

they looked like paper lanterns

or little wooden boats, scoured and dry-docked for the winter.

It was tempting to think of them as ghosts, but they’re just the opposite.

Not the part set free, but the part swept clean—abandoned latticework cabins, open to wind and rain.

Such meticulous tenants, those June bugs. No one is as good at leaving their bodies as they.