I questioned everything alive –

beetles, daddy longleg spiders,

the crayfish at the bottom of the yard

in Mr Sampson’s pond, the pond

that appeared and disappeared

with the rain and provided frogspawn

for my bucket. I kept it in the garage,

watching as it became small-tailed beings,

before the squatter bodies, their struggles

to evolve and survive without being

eaten by their own kind. The harm

lay in forgetfulness and I don’t remember

that they died; I can’t recall what I did

with them. Perhaps I put them back

in the pond, or took them to school,

poor little black dots of anxiety,

their only world red plastic, seconds wide.

From To The Boneyard