The Crane

Because mosquitos

need to live too,

I offered up

my ankles.

This, they said,

is good enough.

Then I came across

an ant, swimming

in an orchid.

He rose

to the surface.

How do you

define

the color orange?

he asked,

twitching.

Orchids in New York:

I had to laugh.

But he was dead

serious.

The sun was orange.

An orange is orange.

The first car I drove

was The Orange Crush.

Then I sat by water.

In the distance

the body and reflection

of a crane

made a beetle, I decided.

Each neck, a pincher.

What else

could I say?

And then it was

the sun again, sinking.