KS Culbreth

shower song

amid the curled iron petals
of the light fixture
a bare bulb glowed brightly
over the bathtub
and at the edge of the
recent growth –
despite the neurotic
faultless scrubbing –
amid a dappling of mildew,
a small grasshopper hung
beside the light
hanging from the wrinkled
white paint of the ceiling,
defying gravity.
and his stiff strong
shadow spread long
over the nearly pealing
paint, his legs sprung
with a vital readiness.
and, bright green,
as my hazel eyes,
and long antennaed
blond as my hair
he hung
defying gravity
and singing his grasshopper
song, something of
a thanatos
over this cleansing font,
and I cheered
at his suspended triumph.
the shower as it blasted
the day’s grime from me,
stirred the air as those sudden,
fierce but brief showers of
april, that force into tight
rings the wooly bear
caterpillars that cooled on the
gray-painted porch.
after I rinsed the soap from
my face and opened my eyes,
reaching for the bar again,
triumphantly, cleaned, again,
as a child’s beginning,
there in the water, splashing
and swirling,
a limp green film,
the grasshopper
tangled in his own
blond strands
rose and settled and folded
in the rough water that barely
covered my toes.
I noticed then, there
was no longer a grasshopper
song.
and looking up at the ceiling
to confirm, noticed only the
spots of mildew and the wrinkled
white paint.
my heart sank
and I scooped the tiny
mash from the water
and placed him on the
floor sunken hearted.
though I had run a brilliant
pace, and nearly cried
amid the killing humidity
at the single drop of rain
and my heart fibrillated
at the tiny moment
of the wounded pigeon
in the roadside gravel,
to witness
the end of the grasshopper’s
bathing song
seemed an abandonment.
the soaked smear on the
tile I pushed a few times
blew my breath upon it
as it curled like clay
around my finger.
I wondered if I could
maybe press its tiny
stomach, flush its lungs
of water.
then I dried and forgot about
it. I sat and began this
true account, forgetting
to check how it should end.
I ran back upstairs and looked
beside the old iron radiator
where I lay the drowned
green.
it was upright and not moving.
I blew my breath on him
once, and his antennae pricked
up.
and blew my breath on him
again, and he sat up, compressing
the spring of his legs and shifting
about to look at me, defensively.
and although he looked at me
defensively, it was enough
that he only looked at me.