light and dark of it

Jean Bohuslav

bright brown butterflies     
                        rabble 
    buffered     
     amongst silver dune grasses   
to hoary tea trees
   descending     
           on retiring winds     
fluttering again
              to rise     
             gracefully   hovering
              near freshly laid eggs

are they disturbed     
               these dignified beauties  
 midst swelling swarms of blustering wasps    
                                   trawling   heaving branches
                                            determined soldiers    
      drunk     with fortitude    
            committed     thieving army
of such a frenzied spectacle 

beach goers plough past     
                      towards salt air  
                    sparkling blue waters     
                                      rippling sands  
                                   caring not     
      for such timely invasions 

painted ladies’ eggs     
                      adulterated     by
                          fornicators on cue     cuckolding     
                          freshly laid clusters     their
                                           hatchling grubs 
            to eat the host’s larvae                   

sometimes life seems unfair     
              how does karma draw
                its strings               it is true            
                                                         we are all food     
                         the great sun god        bound     
feeding on nature’s energy     attached     
    to illusions of duality     unaware
of potentiality’s still sea    

The Science

This poem was inspired by coming across a swarm of wasps laying eggs next to those of butterflies amongst native bushes in the Torquay sand dunes. My computer told me that the burnt orange and pale brown Australian painted ladies with blue eye spots on their wings, lay green eggs in the centre of leaves, taking three days to hatch. There are four stages of metamorphosis: egg, larva, pupa, and adult. The butterfly typically lives two to three weeks in the wild. Some wasps, like the Hyposoter, Horticola and Telenomus wasp, lay their eggs inside butterfly eggs. These wasps' larvae develop in the protective environment of the eggs, eventually consuming and killing the butterfly.

The Poet

Jean Bohuslav's lives in the small town of Torquay on the Surf Coast of Australia. Her poems are often coloured by an interest in mindfulness, which she teaches at U3A Geelong. She contributes to Meniscus Literary Review, London Grip, Spelt Journal, Wee Sparrow, Kissing Dynamite, Shadow Pond Journal, The Interpreters House, Melbourne Culture Corner, Poetry On The Move, Bluepepper, The Crow and Mad Swirl, with two pamphlets published by Ginninderra Press.

Next poem: May Bee by Gaye Manwaring