In the overgrown garden, two soapwort flowers drip with rain. The small book of haiku I’m reading is perfect for swatting mosquitoes.
mosquito
Sun! The meadow glows goldenrod-yellow. Birch leaves at the woods’ edge tremble with warblers. A mosquito sings her thirsty note in my ear.
The scattered creaks of red-winged blackbirds off in the woods. A mosquito wanders over my shirt, testing the fabric with her frail drill.
High in the trees, a small cloud of gnats yoyoing up and down, backlit by the sun, while an itch grows on my hand where a mosquito drills.
Phoebes mate in the rain, their thin branch bobbing as they touch tails. I crush a slow flood-water mosquito with a clap of my hands.
International Migratory Bird Day. From a tall locust, the lazy call of an eastern wood pewee—last migrant back. A mosquito pierces my cheek.
Overcast and cool, with lower humidity at last. Still, the world gets much too close: mosquito in my ear, deer tick traversing my laptop.
Silver-spotted skippers work the last dame’s-rocket, and a day-time cricket begins to chirp. I slap myself in the chest to kill a mosquito.
The clack of acorns hitting branches on their way to the ground. I’m beating myself up trying to kill a mosquito reconnoitering my torso.
In the steady rain, the cheerful bickering of goldfinches. A mosquito brushes against the hair on my arm, looking for a clear way in.
A mantis clings upside-down to a porch column. I wave a mosquito in its direction, and it turns its head to watch the ungainly craft fly by.
While a question mark butterfly mines the pores of my index finger for salt, a mosquito lands on my ring finger and sinks her own probe.
Cloud-to-cloud lightning, thunder like a cloth being torn. Downpour. We’ll remember 2011 for years: “That was the autumn of the mosquitoes.”
A mosquito’s thin song in my ear. I wave her away, then watch as she and another tangle, part, and settle upside-down on the white ceiling.