I.
Leaving my air-
conditioned digs
I drove half an hour
hiked a quarter mile
to spend an eighth
of my 90-degree day
beside an acute angle
of a cascading brook
to beat the heat
read and write
bask in nature
After a time a black fly
not a deerfly, horsefly
bluebottle or mosquito
but some hairy black
disrupted my ennui
divided my attention
buzzed my wrists
landed on my left
left and landed
on my left thigh
left and alighted
left, alighted
left
I waited for it to alight
on the back of my right
thigh, in childish pique
struck with my left hand
I flicked the fly’s hairy
corpse into the creek.
II.
I stayed in my air-conditioned digs
(my naturally unnatural environs)
and left the hairy black fly to his.
I disturbed not his ennui, nor he mine.
Tomorrow I will still be in this crib,
he still basking in his nature.