The unseasonable cold has retreated. This afternoon would have been summerlike except for a certain crispness in the air. Once the sun started falling the illusion of summer vanished. The crisp evenings still have ladybugs and asian stinkbugs dashing inside at every opening of a door. The ones who have made it inside make smaller and larger circles around the window glass. Today I saw a fly join them and thought of this poem before reaching for the swatter:
THE COLD FLY
I see a fly
warming himself on the windowsill,
rubbing his legs, enjoying the morning sun.
He seems to know when the light will shift:
a sudden buzz
and he's at another window.
From Heaven My Blanket, Earth My Pillow: Poems by Yang Wan-Li
Translated and Introduced by Jonathan Chaves
