Dragonfly
THE DRAGONFLY
I went into the laundry. It’s outside the house we (my partner and our children) rent.
The roof, recently fixed, has skylights now, and there inside,
A dragonfly was battering its crisp stick body against the clear plastic, fighting and confused by the inaccessible yet visible light. It was a larger specimen, as long as the span from thumb tip to the end of my small finger.
You’re in trouble, I thought. This may not end well for you.
I had to go, it was time to celebrate the arrival of our smallest son
A year and a day after he came and my wife bled so much, too much, in a birth that was dangerous: she had a torn uterus during the birth and yes she could have died and so could he,
And I think about that all the time and never say much although I was there watching not really understanding but there was something
When he came out of her the nurses watched him intently to see if he would breath properly
He did
I sang to him quietly.
She was alright too, physically, eventually. It took some time. She was hurt.
There were other damages though, and this was our close-dodged apocalypse.
A year later and the boy is strong and hilarious, as filled with life as the other, older one, but his own life – his personality asserted itself early and he is filled with tricks and does as he will. A handful with gold spun curls and a fat tummy, whose greatest joke is in his eyes as he does something and stares over his shoulder at you, his bright gurgling laugh a challenge.
She is – well she is alright, sore, tired, still strong, still crying sometimes but she is moving onward at her own pace doing the work required
When we spoke to the surgeon weeks later he told us the details and he said “I will remember you”.
The trauma is present but fading for me and she is her strong not strong too strong self. Hold her.
A year and a day
We went to a park, cooked sausages. My mother came. My father didn’t. His priorities are peculiar, his choices are made without making them. He forgot the birthday, and I don’t think he really ever took in the story and the fear.
Our friends, her family, a little, low key celebration and there he is, there are a crop of children, running, playing, being children. Bright and funny and hopeful and what will happen? What can we do?
We went home all tired and I went into the laundry again.
The insect buzzed. It was still alive.
I had to do something, try, at least. It was clearly tired: how long had it been there before I saw it the first time?
Its cathedral stained glass wings seemed so delicate
I wondered what approach to take, grabbing a blue plastic dust pan and thinking to perhaps flick the creature out the door
Hoping I would not kill it or damage its delicate body
Hoping it would not fall back in and batter it’s tired self even more on the skylight
I placed the dust pan near it moving slowly
Then
when I got it near
The dragonfly
just climbed onto the dust pan
I moved slowly. I was afraid, tense, breath held. I needed to get it to the clear air. Out the door, holding the object, eyes on the insect: it had a decent size, really. Its wings were long and bright, so close I could see the cell structure, clear with a hard delicacy.
It did not move. I held the pan up. Still it did not go and I looked again: why was it here? Why in my laundry, why?
I gently flick the pan and hear the solid buzz as it flew away. I had children to get to bed.
I told her later, about the dragonfly and I had some pride at my rescue effort and that the insect was away.
“It might have gotten eaten seconds later or just been tired but it did fly”
“you gave it a chance” she said.