THE WEAVE:

Lilith speaks

to herSelves…

"I like Kansas,
for what it is
worth.  Around

the lakes, the forests
are like jungles, full of bright
green beetles.  tHere are

bugs Here, and so
tHere is music.  And it's fine
by me.  I sit

behind a no-see-um
screen, and I feel smug,
but I run through

the forest path, to make it
to the lake, un-bitten.  I have
not showered in 3 days,

during which I have sweat
more than I have
in the past 3 months.

The Water Here smells
sweet, like the ponds
of my homeland, and it

leaves your skin feeling
soft, like the silt
that lines the lake

-bottom.  I am
lucky, I grew
up in murky Water.

"Daddy!  Are you
sure, there is Nothing
that will eat me

in Here?"  I asked
my Father, as a child.
"Only alligators,"

he spun the tale,
as I clung to his back,
scrambling like a cat

trying to stay out
of Water.  Now I am
like an alligator,

swimming up to
my eyeballs.  I run
into a bee,

on her back, so
I lift her in my palm,
as an island, rising

out of the Ocean.
I carry her to shore,
as the carp jump

at low hanging flies,
and I realize, I have stolen
someone's dinner.  I pass

a beetle, floundering,
and I whisper,
"Carpe diem."