I noticed it lying front-down there,
arms and legs that would no longer go
jumping, or swimming in the post-dusk air.
At first, I thought it might awake,
but then, as the hours of teaching went by,
I knew that it would no longer take
the mosquitoes’ whine and evening cry.
Next afternoon, I got the hosepipe,
for it
was still, there, blocked by some wet leaf array;
in gentle fashion, I caused the blockage to wane, bit by bit,
watching it, and it, now float away.
It then went around the corner to
the next stretch of drain,
the water gushing,
that by the time that I went through
the palm tree leaf, it was rushing
to near the exit leading right out to
the monsoon drain; through cement walls, the grill here
the flow helping it on its way through;
maybe the water, too, shed a tear.
Then I pause, in my brain, a thought.
I would let it spend an extra night,
the final in its wet, raw algae court
under the stars, who were watching, tight.
Hence, I left it for one last moon game,
to spend a bit longer by its house;
there
it had played, caused no trouble, wandered around half-tame…
next morning, there was no sign of it where
it spent, I think, much of its time here
in the pipe that takes the bathroom overflow.
I didn’t know it long, or its name,
but felt a tear
to watch a undamaging garden inhabitant go.
The next night, by the door of rough paint and notch
came two others to share the wetness of their communism;
one got into my shoe, arms spread out, to watch,
who knows, like a sports spectator, eager in optimism.
The regulars of ‘The Rear Light’, out they go
in hunting place for insects, in drought or rain,
notifying me, with some content, now I know
that other frogs would come and go again.
