the butterflies will be armed
It was around that time I joined the Neighborhood Coalition for Wilderness
Encouragement. I’d been driving down the highway with my windshield glistening
with no bird shit when I finally saw the connection between the tiny abandoned
mining operations scattered along sidewalk 41 and the things I had going on. My
job was to wake up before dawn, go out in the yard with a fork, and plump up the
night crawlers. I would wait on the steps until I saw a herd of night crawlers
telescoping in the grass. I had the news in my ears. I sensed it was all leading
somewhere: the Coalition, the no birds, the night crawlers. I remember staring
inside the darkness one morning listening to a reporter cry softly on the air.
Encouragement. I’d been driving down the highway with my windshield glistening
with no bird shit when I finally saw the connection between the tiny abandoned
mining operations scattered along sidewalk 41 and the things I had going on. My
job was to wake up before dawn, go out in the yard with a fork, and plump up the
night crawlers. I would wait on the steps until I saw a herd of night crawlers
telescoping in the grass. I had the news in my ears. I sensed it was all leading
somewhere: the Coalition, the no birds, the night crawlers. I remember staring
inside the darkness one morning listening to a reporter cry softly on the air.
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Hazel Hyde. Butterfly Weather Vane, 1938. Watercolor and graphite on paperboard. National Gallery of Art.
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Delia Pless is a poet from North Carolina. Her work can be found in jubilat, LIT, Prelude, Western Beefs of North America, Divine Magnet, Sixth Finch, and Forklift, Ohio. She holds an MFA from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. Her website is www.deliapless.com.