Merian's brush
A moth nicknamed after Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717)
Plum-blue beating heart hanging off thin stalk.
She peeled back the spun cocoon, pupating coils swaddled amidst filmy strands.
If a moth were a crystal, it would beat within its diamond-studded span.
Harsher still, it molts off the red waving banner unfurling behind itself.
The pale tussock incarnates to dew drops, silk scarf, yellowed jester, dyed cotton wings.
Plucked together on a straightened tree branch, a hushed moving vibrant—
Saturated horsehair leaves no finer trace.
To get a moth—
Tear your hair out and wrap it in silk
Crush cloves and lavender in a marble bowl
Infuse mint tea and tar
Steep yourself in this bath
Your skin will harden
There will be no blood
Only the flimsy remains, your shoulders aching
Crack walnuts in your jaw
Only when you have been broken
Will the moth crawl out
scale wing
ferrasols highly
weathered subsurface
low activity clays
in mountainous regions and alluvial
soils acrisols
deep and dense clay
winged
like the tiles of a roof hooked or clubbed
large, shiny metallic blue
and spectacular perceived by eyes
unable to focus
visual signs
scaled
between the molts the instar
*
Alyse Bensel is the author of two chapbooks, Not of Their Own Making (Dancing Girl Press, 2014) and Shift (Plan B Press, 2012). Her poetry has most recently appeared in Mid-American Review, Heavy Feather Review, and Ruminate, among others. She serves as the Book Review Editor at The Los Angeles Review and as Co-Editor of Beecher’s.