L

Life Cycle of the Dragonfly

Before flight & bright water, this pixilate air―
splash-cast, unhatched, no glimpse of milk, just

one more dirt-poor palpi quivering in brindle.

As lowly yolk I hid scribbles inside other books.
As callow nymph stood upon the Roman pont,

cobbled streets, a vast sand dune, so many ruins
& squandered every moment, just like you. No matter.

Emergence is by far the older story: shed shell,
burst first breath. Instinct is our parent, too,

& motion: avalanche or nebulae in labor:

Put off the worm put on the dragonfly 
Put off the sycophant, put on the Oppressor!

From the Ganges emerge―
Like Hermes enter.

 

Cover Art by Stephanie Broussard

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Amy Beeder

Amy Beeder’s third book, And So Wax Was Made & Also Honey, is recently out from Tupelo Press. A recipient of an NEA Fellowship, a Discovery/The Nation Award, and a James Merrill Fellowship, she has worked as a creative writing instructor, freelance writer, political asylum specialist, high school teacher in West Africa, and a human rights observer in Haiti and Suriname. Her work has appeared in Poetry, American Poetry Review, The Kenyon Review, The Nation, Ploughshares, AGNI, The Southern Review, and other journals.

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