The Troubadour

Ride Credit

Troubadour

The erstwhile dog-day troubadour
Beats upon his belly’s kettle drum,
His song a steady tuneless thrum -
A maddening, constant, screeching hum -
From dawn’s soft light through setting sun,
Courting death in his frantic search for amour:
This summer’s-end winged troubadour.

For three lustra and two circuits of the sun,
Our hero suckled on tree roots underground,
Until his way to the surface could be found,
Where females strained to hear his sound.
When, at last, he felt his wings unbound,
When Magicada’s imago cycle had begun,
He plumped – dried – his wings in July sun.

The assassin, too, listens for his song,
And, when it’s heard, she takes to wing;
Oblivious to her, he proceeds to sing.
He does not flinch upon her sting,
Though a squirming death it will bring.
Her egg inside him will hatch ere long,
After her venom stills his shrill song.

The valkryja glides her prize to her lair,
Where other Sæhrímnirs line the hall,
Providing grisly meat and mead for all
Her wriggling einherjar, still so small.
The troubadour’s carcass begins to fall
To dust in a chamber filled with dank air,
Inside the wasp’s subterranean lair.

The troubadour’s rêve de mort is brief,
Like his life; a fading, melancholy review
Of all the things he had hoped to do –
Songs to be sung, the pitching of ardent woo –
A simple life, really, not much for him to do.
His early demise brings Troubadour deep grief,
Abridging a life-span predestined to be brief.

Adieu, little dog-day troubadour.
You’ll beat your kettle drum no more.

© 2009 Martha McLemore