Shelter All day, the rain has been plinking, plunking, finally pelting down. The whole time, latched to a slat on the back of a bench outside my kitchen window, a praying mantis. Like a wooden clothespin with electric-green limbs, not praying but splayed, tiny guy wires that wrap and cling. Invertebrate body looking like the offspring of a pterodactyl tamped into the cast of a clasped pocketknife. Still as a stick. If this were me, I would fan my wings and flail at the wet. Check and re-check the weather on my phone. At the very least wail about the lack of a cup of hot tea. But no. Here’s a slim Zen priest, head bowed beneath the lip of the rickety seat’s top rail. Just clearing fat raindrops, poised to plop into the abyss. Alert, as the sutras teach. At ease.
Paige Gilchrist lives in Asheville, NC, where she writes poetry and teaches yoga. Her poems have appeared in Kakalak, Autumn Sky Poetry Daily, and The Great Smokies Review.
Amethyst Review 