On my walk the other day,
I met Beetle.
Not sure who she was;
something Scarabaeidae
thumb-joint-sized
shiny gold-green
bright hexapod centered
on the sidewalk square.
…I looked again.
She wouldn’t fly.
Couldn’t.
One wing missing
the other bent in semaphore.
Distressed.
I could see her buggy innards twisting around
laboring within the shell.
Crush her now!
I said to my sold self
I thought
to end her suffering.
Find your compassion!
Pity from you will save her
hours of agony.
Don’t just leave her there
struggling to right herself
in pain
until she dies of it;
hold her permanent
in your Merciful hand.
…I looked again.
No, not in pain, it seemed,
but molting
another like-thing
inside
flexing, bending to escape
the pretty tomb.
She was not dead
but growing —
outgrowing.
How glad I did not crush her!
I moved her to the grass
to thwart Bird’s lunch.
…and looked again.
The thing inside was no facsimile.
Not a new stronger brighter scarab
but something eating that.
A grub or worm,
no less entitled to her corpse than I,
whose excavations mimed distress.
I left them to their cycle there
unbothered
and walked on.
Yes And Further 