prayer

no one is watching and then, i watch

a praying mantis ladders the window screen
and i don’t believe in mistakes

so my looking at the moment she shimmies
herself upside down, as i understand it,
is a kind of signal for a new year

one where when a dusty god in the lowgrass
nips at my ankles, it translates to kissing
to a welt in honor of pleasure

what i am trying to say is there’s some sort of heaven
in her triangle head

in the way she turns toward me
rocking as if weeping

how motion can soothe
how power can arrive on naked wings
without warning

i do believe in sequences
how things belong to sound and meaning
a place from which we can measure

mantis, from the greek word for prophet

i want to be the butterfly
in her mouth

a silence snatched from the air