poop beetle: evening with Harry
8.2003
Harry asks me, "what's that? . . . what's that sound?"
"What did you say?" I ask him. "What's that sound?"
"What you say?" Harry repeats. "That. chicka, chicka?" He stands on the back porch and his body, much more expressive than his speech, wriggles with interest.
He says it again as a question, "chicka, chicka? What's that you say?"
And than I hear it. Locusts? I have no idea. A sound like the ocean, so constant you wouldn't stop to wonder. The obvious backdrop to all this misty green.
"Bugs, sweetheart. That's right. Chicka, Chicka."
"What you say? Chicka? Bugs? . . . . Chicken? . . . . Chicken Bugs!"
Why not? Sure. Something like that. (I'm so done pretending I have answers).
"Chicken Bugs!" he crows and throwing his arms in the air, he embraces the evening and a name for that sound.
