The Frog at Tinker Creek

“It was less like seeing than like being for the first time seen,
knocked breathless by a powerful glance.”
        Annie Dillard, from Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

His upper torso clings to the rock,
bottom half concealed beneath
the water’s surface,
mouth agape, body still.

He should be scurrying away by now,
instead, he is letting me come closer.

It is then I realize the violence
being played out below.

Giant water beetle approaches its
prey from behind, sucking out
the insides of the victim,

Therefore, the frog is not moving,
adheres to the rock with his spread-out hands,
horror on his face, mouth a silent scream,
the exhausted skin now opening and closing
like the petals of a wilting flower,
soft as shoe leather.

Finally, the emptied skin leaves nothing of the frog
except the awful gaping mouth, frozen eyes,
upper arms stretched out in a sort of last appeal
as he offers himself to this role he must endure
to its finality.

At long last the face sinks slowly down,
body deflated, face following,
surrender solidified on a frog’s face,

The body a parachute fluttering
slips soundlessly into the water

His acquiescence as serene
as death should be.