[receding sphinx]

I'm working with a common family of flower feeders. Many
are wide-ranging and have already been identified: one-eyed,
laurel, waved, walnut, lettered. I have found one, however, I
believe to be new to classification. Its wings have the rippled
driftwood of a modest and the hot crimson of a twin
spotted. In shape and size, the body is what you would
expect: short, round, tapered at the tip, but here the
similarities end. The whole trunk appears to be clear like the
transparent wings of a hummingbird or wasp mimic. In the
case of a lucent wing, we see through the veined panels to
whatever happens to be on the other side, but this is like
peering through glass into some unpupiled eye.

Copyright © 2009 Lisa Olstein All rights reserved
from Lost Alphabet
Copper Canyon Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission