Anisoptera

Lorelei Bacht

To be immemorial. To reside
in this exact instant. Snap luminance
Renewed for no more than five weeks.

Five invincible weeks. To learn – to know
How to throw ourselves into voids, into
Savage encounters, the freshwater

Feast. To be winged unequal, at ease
With the kill. To be conspicuous in flight,
And choose not to care: We are fast.

To be that fast, to bolt, to light, to see
So much of the world at once: the first,
The last, the sun’s unblinking eye. At last,

To grab one another midair, collision
Of bloodlines in curves, transparencies.
To hope the nebulous, compelling hope

That something of us will go on.