18 June 2012
There was once a terrible monster lived in a pond, deep under the water.
Brown as mud he was, in the mud he hid, among murk of reed-root, sodden twigs, with his long hungry belly, six legs for creeping, eyes like headlights awake or sleeping; but he was not big.
A tiddler came to sneer and jeer and flaunt his flashing tail – Ugly old stick-in-the-mud couldn’t catch a snail! I’m not scared - when, like a shot, two pincers nab him, and he’s got!
For the monster’s jaw hides a clawed stalk like the arm of a robot, a dinner fork, that’s tucked away cunningly till the last minute – shoots out – and back with a victim in it!
Days, weeks, months, two years and beyond, fear of the monster beset the pond; he lurked, grabbed, grappled, gobbled, and grew, ambushing always somewhere new –
Who saw him last? Does anyone know? Don’t go near the mud! But I must go! Keep well away from the rushes! But how? Has anyone seen my brother? Not for a week now – he's been eaten for certain!
And then, one day, it was June, they all saw him. He was coming slowly up out of the mud, they stopped swimming. No one dared approach, attack. They kept back.
Up a tall reed they saw him climbing higher and higher, until he broke the surface, climbing still.
There he stopped, in the wind and the setting sun. We’re safe at last! they cried. He’s gone! What became of the monster, was he ill, was he sad? Was nobody sorry? Had he crept off to die? Was he mad?
Not one of them saw how, suddenly, as if an invisible knife had touched his back, he has split, split completely – his head split like a lid! The cage is open. Slowly he comes through, an emperor, with great eyes burning blue.
He rests there, veils of silver a cloak for him. Night and the little stars travel the black pond, and now, first light of day, his shining cloak-wide wings, a flash, a whirr, a jeweled helicopter, he’s away!
O fully he had served his time, shunned and unlovely in the drab slime, for freedom at the end – for the sky – dazzling hunter – Dragonfly!
~~Libby Houston
Dragonfly • Opuss № I