Jay Yoo

Here is a poem that caught my imagination. Like being “green,” my goal is to do as little harm as possible to insects. This poem by Alex Boyd pretty much sums up as to why.

When a roach is killed I utter a curse to accompany
the death but spiders (I have decided)
are more noble, and each time one is killed
a sad haiku that should have been written
goes quietly missing.

Is it true that when we kill an insect we don’t
know if it was an ancestor back to watch us?
Some are either noble or stupid, holding
still while we close a tissue around it,
appearing to honour it, drape it in a cloak
before crushing it, to a broken spot, legs torn off.

Is it true that when we die we feel
insect justice, every one we ever killed
crawling on our bodies while we offer
explanations: sorry, you surprised me in my kitchen

at night but for what it’s worth, I went back
to my lover in the dark and tried to find her
in the bed - her leg here and torso there, not
where I expected - we were crushed by the darkness

by Alex Boyd