The Rescue
by Jo Angela Edwins
I hear its buzz before I see it,
the beetle, speckled, round as a helicopter,
crawling my sleeve toward lamplight.
Its gauzy wings protrude
from beneath the lacquered shell--
at the slightest spasm set for take-off.
I reach my hand slowly behind it,
timing the seizure, gauging the grip,
hoping to hold without hurting.
I know its impulse to flight,
the panicked stir it will make in its fleshy prison
as I walk to the window sill,
the grassy smell its fear will leave
on my fingertips, the palm of my hand.
When I drop it into the night,
it will catch itself on wind,
spiral backwards, find its way
again to the shut pane--
a mirage, a starved space glowing
with the promise of a false sun.
Tomorrow its life may end,
and I would have no way of knowing.
BIO
Jo Angela Edwins has published poems in over 100 journals and anthologies. She is author of the collection A Dangerous Heaven (2023, Gnashing Teeth) and the chapbooks Play (2016, Finishing Line), and Bitten (2025, dancing girl). She is a Pushcart Prize, Forward Prize, Bettering American Poetry, and Best of the Net nominee and has received awards from Winning Writers, Poetry Super Highway, the Jasper Project, and the SC Academy of Authors. She teaches at Francis Marion University in Florence, SC, and is the poet laureate of the Pee Dee region of South Carolina.