Sudden, Overwhelming

First song of evening, a single cricket
                         shears twilight loose
from every blade of grass. Perhaps
                         not so much song
as desire spread out upon us, intimate

                       with shadows, amorous
with oncoming darkness. Owls
                       and whippoorwills won’t
venture this close. They won’t add
                       counterpoint to dusk.

These streets susurrate with tire whisper,
                       light buzz, chatter
of neighbors. People keep crickets
                       for luck, a symbol
of happiness. There will be windfall

                      apples in the latest
days of summer when yellow jackets
                      and bees sup of
broken flesh. Sometimes the flesh
                      is broken. This lone 

cricket will be gone by then, his progeny
                    a chorus to waning day.
Every summer, one gets into the house,
                    hides behind furniture,
causes a ruckus with the cats. When you

                catch it, close your fingers
around it, a handful of darkness, it tickles
                 your palm with
its spiky legs. Wait until fall. You can
                walk through dry grass

gone to seed. Every step stirs an exodus,
                 all those desperate
creatures leaping away from the inevitable,
                a flood that stirs up
emotions you thought would never surface.

-David B. Prather

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