Brood XIII, 1956
The cicada chorus
rains down through
the fading day
piercing into the
street’s failing light.
The day comes
when they start
like an unannounced
house guest
loud with personal
habits—and
the song is there
in the sticky
afternoon heat
and deep into
restless sleep.
Cicadas live high
in sunlit trees
waving gently
in the summer air
—projecting love songs,
songs scraped out
on the belly to
listening ladies of
lazy afternoons.
Waiting for that
female acceptance flick
that will bring
to a distant summer
the chorus
of congregating cicadas
high in succulent trees
trapping memories
of 1956.
Five-years old
monstrous--
they landed on
arms, hair, and shirt--
black, shining wings,
red bug eyes—unpredictable
in need.
Brush them off
with a child’s scream
with disgust
with terror
with fear
and a boy’s fascination.
Pick up their
desiccated shells
found clinging to bark
or fallen in grass--
for an eyeball
to eyeballs study--
then restless
hook their claws
into shirts
and sweaters of
the always unsuspecting
to witness
the thought that
this one might
be monstrously alive.
As each summer
turns to September
—and then October;
I listen harder now
and more often
as the cicadas
rock the trees
lining this block
with their communal
unrequited love.
It was just
yesterday--
or the day before—that
the cicada’s song
dominated the night.
Somewhere in silence
in the remotely high
sunlit trees--
the song ends.
East Lansing
October 17, 2004
Greenfield Series
©2004 Brood XIII, 1956 — Joseph W. Yarbrough
Reproduction prohibited without written permission.
rains down through
the fading day
piercing into the
street’s failing light.
The day comes
when they start
like an unannounced
house guest
loud with personal
habits—and
the song is there
in the sticky
afternoon heat
and deep into
restless sleep.
Cicadas live high
in sunlit trees
waving gently
in the summer air
—projecting love songs,
songs scraped out
on the belly to
listening ladies of
lazy afternoons.
Waiting for that
female acceptance flick
that will bring
to a distant summer
the chorus
of congregating cicadas
high in succulent trees
trapping memories
of 1956.
Five-years old
monstrous--
they landed on
arms, hair, and shirt--
black, shining wings,
red bug eyes—unpredictable
in need.
Brush them off
with a child’s scream
with disgust
with terror
with fear
and a boy’s fascination.
Pick up their
desiccated shells
found clinging to bark
or fallen in grass--
for an eyeball
to eyeballs study--
then restless
hook their claws
into shirts
and sweaters of
the always unsuspecting
to witness
the thought that
this one might
be monstrously alive.
As each summer
turns to September
—and then October;
I listen harder now
and more often
as the cicadas
rock the trees
lining this block
with their communal
unrequited love.
It was just
yesterday--
or the day before—that
the cicada’s song
dominated the night.
Somewhere in silence
in the remotely high
sunlit trees--
the song ends.
East Lansing
October 17, 2004
Greenfield Series
©2004 Brood XIII, 1956 — Joseph W. Yarbrough
Reproduction prohibited without written permission.