FLIES

They'll come
she says just smear some
jelly from your sandwich on the back of your hand and wait

how she passes
the drowsy hour of math before
lunch the initials carved like braille into the desk a fly

alights on her
sleeve her wrist they are
drawn to us drawn to what is sweet in us our life is sweet

like summoning
a friend out of the air sly
quick cute this germ of being the jewel of its eye seeing

her 8,000
times tough brown as a nut
with horses on her shirt she calls come down little fly man

little wolf
circling the room better you
than the teacher dragging his chalky hand across the board

a blur
in the air you are God's
least angel after the seraphim and thrones after the powers

your hunched thorax
and fuzzy throbbing abdomen
your mobile mouthparts sponging and sucking. If you don't

have any jelly
it's enough to lick your hand
she says they come for us they come for the taste of us.

--John Witte