russell brickey

PRAYING MANTIS


Deep inside the planet that is my father, moons
shattered, stars disintegrated, novas bloomed in

the soft human story like the suns which
broke apart in the glass of the jars under my bed.

We took playground death much more casually
then. There would come a day when I discovered

devotion in my quiet moments, but only epochs
after such casual cruelty found a new sunstruck home

stuffed with a few broken twigs from fields
of dusty grass, still there 30 years gone, still hiding

tiny parishioners in their temples. Other
parts of childhood are missing, however, never

to return; we are lulled by the clouds and the sun
and the martyrdoms of the summer, its emerald sacrifice.

Their triangle heads tilt as if asking
a question, their bladed arms arm themselves,

but their cloudy milk-green eyes show
nothing as my hands close around them

until their bodies dry to parchment,
and then to dust.