__ Catch / Confetti

A Relic

The monarch, 

stuck to my car battery,

detaches intact,

 
wings folded down

in paper-mâché flight.

Just that side

is ruined, burned black

where the fingers— like

veins in a leaf—

touched the electric box.

I show it to my sister,

holding the petrified-

pollinator up 

like half a flower. Then

I rest it on the corner

of my desk

and examine the slated

wings, stitched with dust,

and the legs

cooled into a cringe.

The eyes shine back

and to the side, saying

you wake up one morning

and it’s all dreams, 

then nothing,

this life you have now.  

 

by Michael Klenda