Stopped at a traffic light,
I see a furry, purple mosquito
wearing a long, red tie
and holding a butterfly net
in a humanoid hand—
a pest control mascot,
a corporate logo on a truck
menacing in his contrived cuteness.

“What's his backstory?” 
I wonder. “What rejection
(A prom? A promotion?) 
made an insect with insect parents, 
insect teachers, insect coworkers 
join the fight for insect genocide? 
Was it the sign-on bonus, 
the conviction that he's one of the 'good ones',
the uniform, the hollow authority 
of a useless butterfly net?”

(I bet he often jabs a plastic straw
Into veins and inhales 
Because he's so macho
Because “flying egg receptacles”,
His term for females,
Suck blood, and anything they can do 
He can do better.)

“I'm part of the solution—
the final solution,”
I imagine him quipping
and spitting out blood
as his ghastly joke leaves him 
doubled over, gasping for breath.
But he doesn't get the problem
and doesn't know his masters' equation:
“insect + suit + tie=cosplaying insect”

One of the good ones?
Not to us,
And to them he’s a killing joke—
they choke on laughs
imagining him,
the self-important gasser,
becoming the gassed
once he’s gassed the others
in the miniature orange jumpsuits,
the uniform destined to replace his tie
and grotesque mosquito executive costume.

My name is Harlan Grubb, and this is a true story, though some parts didn't happen. When I was eleven goin' on twelve, my cousin Ennis dared me to walk from the top of the holler, through Black Maggie's woods and out Old Hope cemetery to the creek at the bottom, in the dead of night. I still think he done me dirty, darin' me right in front of Mary Gay Hollister like he did. 'Course, I'd've done it anyway, but doin' it right in front of the girl I was sweet on was a nasty trick.

It was just after church one Sunday, and Mary Gay and I was strollin’ along the path together, when we came across Ennis, holdin’ court with a pack of little’uns. He was goin’ about the ghost of the witch, Black Maggie, who stalked the woods at night lookin’ for kiddies to put in’er pot. I said that he was full of the stuff that makes the grass grow. And he looked at me serious like and says if that was so, I’d take a stroll through the woods after dark.

"Don't do it, Harlan!" Mary Gay beseeched, "Everyone knows them woods is hexed! And Old Hope is just filled with haints!"

"Well half of my kinfolk are buried there," I said, smilin,' "might be nice seein' em."

"What if ya' wander onto the railroad tracks like Anse Gillespie did two summers back?" she asked.

I smiled wider and said, "Well, then, I'll just hop the freight and ride the rails clear to Tennessee!"

It made her smile as well, despite her fears, and she could see I would not be moved, so she had her mamaw make me up a conjure bag to wear. "It's to ward off evil," she said, "It's got mugwort, mountain ash, a piece a' cauld iron and a bible verse innit." Then she blushed up all pink and looked at her shoes, "I put a little lock of my hair innit as well."

"Aw hell," I said, puffin out my chest, "I don't believe in none of that granny witch stuff. The worst thing I'll meet in those woods is a raccoon and maybe a moonshiner."

I did take the bag a course, though it was just 'cause I was sweet on her and didn't wanna hurt her feelings none, ya' understand. And so, with the moon risin,' I commenced my travels. I was to meet Ennis and the other boys down on the t'other side of the creek at the bottom of the hill.

She was a big ol' gal, that moon, so that I could see my way pretty well through there, and even though the woods were a might dark, I kept my bearing with the stars. It was one those late summer nights when if you cock your head right when the wind is blowin' you could smell fall not far off. Some might've been ascared at this point, cause of all that talk of the witch Black Maggie's hex and haints and unnatural critters. Not me, though. I walked right and said, "I ain't scart of no haints or old granny witches, ya' hear?"

That was when I heard a little somethin' moving around in the trees. I knew folks talked about a wampus cat huntin' in those woods. I didn't believe in no wampus cats, a course, that was more hog-swill. And though I mighta started walkin' just a hair faster, it wasn't ‘cause I was scared of a made-up critter. I was just eager to get the job over with.

So, I was walkin' a might bit faster, and that sound that wasn't a wampus cat was still hangin' behind me. That's when I spotted two big ol' eyes lookin' down from a tree. I had heard some boys' tellin' tales about a big old fella with wings instead of arms that flew just like a moth, over West Virginia way. I knew there weren't no such things as moth men, a course, and whatever was up there in that tree weren't no monster. So that ain't why I began to move a bit quicker, just so ya' understand.

            I was just about halfway down the side of the hill, with the two big ol' critters behind me and Old Hope and the creek ahead, goin' at a good pace. Twas then I saw an old granny moving around in the trees. She was skinny as a stick, her hair all a mess, sticking up crazy like, and she was reachin' out with long, bony looking fingers. In the dark, she was just a shape, so's I couldn't make out her face, even still though I knew it weren't Black Maggie, seein' as she'd been in her grave some hundred years already. I started runnin', just cause I didn't want to get caught up talkin' to some old granny in the woods when I had a dare to finish, ya' see.

So, there I was runnin', and I see the rough stone wall and the first graves of Old Hope, all dotted over the ground like little nasty teeth. There was a thick ol' mist rollin' around 'em and I was tryin' my best not to trip and break my neck goin' through. The air smelled of moss and rich wet soil. I take a nice deep breath and hold it, puffin' out my cheeks like a chipmunk. Some folks do that cause they're afraid of haints, but I just think it's proper and my mama raised me to be proper.

That's when I heard this terrible, great screamin' sound rumblin' up out of the woods, soundin' like an earthquake and a screech owl all rolled into one. Then, a strange and ghastly light shone through the trees and fell on the graves. I saw her then, a real, live ghost.

She stood with arms stretched out to her sides, her skin all gray, and seemin' to glow when the light hit her. The mighty squealin' sound was still goin' strong, and I knew she musta been wailin' like the haints in tales do, fortellin' doom and death. Ya' might think I was scared. But I didn't bat an eye, just kept right on a-goin' past. It took a trick to keep on runnin' while I held my breath, lemme tell ya.'

Then I heard voices talkin' and the sound of water. I was gettin' close. Some folks believe that a haint can't cross no moving water. So, I just started bookin' my way down, falling over roots and rocks as I did. I came out of the trees, and there was Ennis and his friends, and the creek, the moon shining off it like a lantern.

"Boy she pops! He did it!" I heard little Corbin Lewis hollerin'.

"Not yet, still gots to cross the water," Ennis said.

That's when they all started shoutin', "Come on, Harlan!" "That's it! Almost there!" "Come on! Come on!"

I reached the bank of the creek, and I didn’t stop. Throwin' myself off the shore, I flew through the cool night air and hit that water with an enormous splash, like a record-breakin' trout. The cold stung, and my mouth filled with the taste of grit and alkali. Still, I swam hard, heading towards the sounds of human voices.

Finally, my hand hit the other shore, and I pushed myself up off the ground. I rolled onto my back and laid there, takin' a nice deep breath of night air and lookin' up at the stars, drenched in the water of the mountains.

Presently, the gaggle of boys all gathered around me and looked me over. Their mouths were agape with wonder as I stared back up at them.

"What happened?" asked one.

"What didja ya' see?" asked another.

I took a few more deep breaths, then reached out and let them haul me up. "Aw, hell," I said, sittin' up, "there's nothin' in those woods."

They tell us the swamp has a mouth.
Not teeth, not tongue, not lips—just a mouth big enough to swallow a whole town.
When the night is hot and the frogs scream too loud, you can hear it breathe.
Inhale: the cypress bow.
Exhale: the sawgrass rattles.
Mama says if you lean close enough to the water, it will whisper your name,
syllable by syllable, until you forget it was ever yours.

We grow up testing her words.
We throw stones into the shallows, count the ripples, wait for the echo.
Sometimes it calls back. Sometimes it stays quiet,
like it’s waiting for us to say something worth the answer.

The elders warn us: Don’t talk to the swamp. Don’t listen too long.
The swamp remembers more than you do.
But warnings don’t matter to children. Warnings are the first door you open.

The first time I heard it speak clear,
I was ten years old, crouched with my cousin Jonah at the levee.
We had dared each other closer and closer until our toes slid into the mud.
The air hung heavy, mosquitoes chewing our necks raw.
And then—
It spoke.

Not a growl. Not a chant.
A voice. Low. Familiar.
It said Jonah’s name the way his mama used to say it when she called him in from the porch.
Jonah froze. His mama had been dead three years.
The voice said it again, longer this time.
Joooooo-nah.
His mouth trembled, but no sound came out.
Then he ran, faster than I’d ever seen him,
tripping through the cane until he disappeared.
I stayed.
I stayed because the swamp was still calling.
And after Jonah’s name, it whispered mine.

The mouth of Florida doesn’t speak in sentences.
It sings in syllables, stretches vowels, clicks consonants like bones.
It makes a hymn out of your breath,
a chant out of your silence.
It tells you what you didn’t know you wanted to hear.

Some nights, the whole town gathers by the water.
Old men with shirts unbuttoned to their navels.
Girls with braids heavy as ropes.
Mothers rocking babies wide-eyed with sleep.
We line up along the bank, waiting.
Because sooner or later, the swamp always speaks.

It told Rosa she’d marry a man with a smile sharp as a hook.
She did. He left. She came back, stood on the bank,
and the swamp crooned her name softer, like an apology.

It told Mr. Alvarez he’d live to ninety-nine.
He laughed, slapped his knee.
The next year, he died at sixty-two.
The swamp never took it back.

It told me once:
You will vanish and return,
vanish and return.
I waited for more, but the reeds just shivered,
like they were clapping for themselves.

The swamp has no loyalty, no pity.
It speaks what it wants.
And we keep coming back for it, greedy for sound.

One night, I brought my daughter.
She pressed close, holding my hand tight.
“Will it talk to me?” she whispered.
I told her to wait. To listen.
The frogs screamed, then stopped all at once.
The air shifted.
And then the voice rose, rolling across the water.
Her name.
Drawn out, sweet, almost laughing.
She gasped, clutched my arm.
“Did you hear?” she asked.
I nodded, though my heart clenched.
Because the voice was mine.
The swamp had borrowed my own mouth.

I thought of Mama, how she used to say:
If the swamp calls you in your own voice, never answer back.
That’s how it gets you.

We backed away, slow.
My daughter kept asking what it meant.
I told her nothing. I told her everything.
We didn’t go back for a long time.

But the mouth doesn’t forget.
It keeps breathing, pulling names out of the dark.
Sometimes when I wash dishes,
I hear it sigh in the pipes.
When I dream,
I hear my own voice humming from under the floorboards.
When I wake,
the sheets smell faintly of algae and salt.

The mouth is not closing.
The mouth is not done.

They say one day it will open wide,
wider than the river, wider than the sky.
And when it does, every name it ever called
will tumble out at once.
Dead names. Unborn names.
Names of people who left and never came back.
Names of those who never had names at all.
A flood of syllables,
rising, falling, colliding until the whole world drowns in sound.

When that happens,
there will be no need to hide,
no need to listen.
We will all be speaking at once.
And the swamp will finally be silent.

Until then, we wait by the levee.
We press our ears to the water.
We breathe when it breathes.
We sing when it sings.
We wait for the mouth to open again.

Because in the end,
Florida doesn’t have coasts or borders or counties.
Florida has only the mouth.
And sooner or later,
we all go in.

Memories

I once saw Michael Trent in London. It was long after the war and my mother was looking the other way, thank God, because I didn’t want to share him, not even with my mother. It was special, seeing him, even though it was just a glimpse. The day was not remarkable, there was no miracle about it although I do remember the sun was smiling at us, but then I was only five at the time, so the sun could still do things like smile instead of just shine.

And then I knew it was surely him; Michael looked like the photograph we had, standing at attention, his Royal Air Force uniform appeared almost starched. When you think about how impossible that would be, because the photo was taken in ‘39 and the war was everywhere then. No one had time to do such things as starch a uniform. 1939 was eight years after my mother met him, her stories about them together were always spellbinding, the days were perfect, their clothing was perfect, her perfume was exquisite, although, to hear her tell it, it was the last quarter ounce of the most expensive French perfume on the continent. And maybe that part was true, because both she and I wanted it to be that way.

That day in London we were hurrying along Bridge Street, there was the remaining rubble on the curb and some even in the street. My woolen skirt was making my knees itch, and I cursed the warmer weather because we couldn’t afford suitable clothes with the changing season.            

But when I saw Michael Trent, I forgot the itchy wool rubbing my irritable knees. His hair was longer, blond with some red highlights picked out by the sun. I remember how he saw her, my mother, and then looked down at me, he being well over six feet tall, and his face became sad. He lifted his hand up and waved and called out, “Daria!” and she turned and saw him, and the world changed for us, for the first time, at least the first time that I knew about it.

No one ventured to linger
under the palm
near the crematorium.
There was an occult snake
in a hole on the trunk.
Nobody had seen it.

Spooky fronds grew in the dark.
An owl’s hoot entertained the ghosts.
It was as an arcane alarm
before seizing a soul.
The rustic lips rippled holy words.
Those knuckleheads pretended
to be know-it-alls.
Though different in caste and creed,
they were unified in delusion. 

The village woodcutter,
whose mind was wedged
between superstition and stupidity,
couldn’t even touch the giant tree.
He knew it would bleed,
triggering his death. 

Now a new highway is taking shape.
A chainsaw’s vroom
pierces the bucolic belief.
No bleeding.
Nothing uncanny beneath the bark.
But these people aren’t dismayed,
for they have lost just one palm.

Item descriptionI heard the dead feast on sun-fat apples,
down where the wheel and the highway sing.
The stars and hill-stones shimmer in the song
as ghosts draw close to the mist-veiled oak
by the dream-spanned bridge to Avalon

where you crossed to that sleepy shore
in grief, as summer bent its golden head,
beneath the reaping blade and combines’ roar
where a hedge witch, her leafy fingers spread
to catch the sun, crouched half a thousand years

her crooked back bent low at Green Street,
by the crossroads, tangled in the knots and yarns,
earth-rooted clay, and flying time; holding tight
the anvil stone, where the song thrush breaks snails
from their shells and where two midnights meet

so the living and the dead, might dream
of the old hill: strong-footed in the ripe wheat
side by side, united in the acorn spell
and heart, in heart held dear, by the lithe ash,
walk among spring snowdrops and greening thorn

and ride through late October’s leafy storm
and in fruitful autumn pick penny buns
and leap the wild, white, rushing winterbourne
and dance footprints through December snow
and at harvest, kiss in the golden corn

and you might cross again to walk among
the cranesbill and meadowsweet and ox tongue
once more descend from out the barrow hill
our paths folded in the old lane, as rests the sun
at the door of night, like a half-awakened dream.

Yet I call you home and your light grows pale
I say ‘awake’; unwilling, you cling to sleep.
You are fugitive in my memory
as the flowers fade from their summer bloom.
Your face has changed; too strange and ghostly

beneath the far October stars, so bright.
And your eyes are lost in shadows so deep
and you speak only of that distant shore
and when I draw aside your long black veil,
you plead that you are disturbed no more.

I woke with a city sewn under my skin—
Lamplight was fever, towers had teeth.
The clocks all forgot where the hours had been,
I wandered through static stitched under the heath.
The wind clicked in glyphs carved from shattered brass bones,
and shadows rehearsed what the mirrors unlearned.
My echo came back in a chorus of tones,
reciting the names of the lives I had burned.
There were trains made of breath, saints wired for pain,
and a chapel of ghosts where my copy once prayed.
He bled into circuit, he begged for the rain,
then kissed the dead wire where my pulse had decayed.
So I climbed through the code, through hunger and sin—
and met my own voice looking out, looking in.