Natural Exaltation

Listen, pay heed, attend and you may hear
the click, click, click (albeit soft), of the
Louisiana Clicker, a new spider just
discovered (as new species go),
ochre toned, delta-shaped,
orange eyes pronounced
as if tiny tocsins
afire.

So named since found in
southern Louisiana, where
rain has fallen swift to flood
a lot, and urged arachnids out
and into the trees from thickset
roots, from mossy fen, from their
habitat of lime crevasse or bramble
thicket fine for web.  So click, click,
click, ticks Louis (a name applied by
spider folk who found him out.)

Apace he darts beyond third click
as if eight-legged electron, and
those white-coated, goateed
in gloat monitor wee Louis,
each and every move fodder
for fill in Nature.  Housed
in lab beneath some glass,
Louis lines bonsai tree
with green silk from
productive duct,
orifice of web-
making do.

Entrapping strings
of new species artisan
loiter said bonsai awhile,
opaque in charm to sprawl
like gloss, while men with pens
and clipboards scurry unsettled,
knowing Louis is no barrier to awe,
but is reason to clap and cheer for the
magnificence of biodiversity, for the
triumph that is life.


40 Lines
Writer’s Cramp
3-12-16