Yellow flies the time

 Yellow fly’s the time

Johnclarestokes 

There were long hours spent on the porch

Tin roof shading from the Florida sun 

The silence interrupted by the wire swatter

From beneath in sand the ants would come

Carrying below the high porch the silent

ones who moments before sucked blood

The itching persisting into the evening

As the moths circled around the bare

yellow bulb swaying to the rocking

Mosquitoes waking for the evening shift

The fly swatter of little use to defend

bare flesh from the incessant assaults 

‘til we’d have to retreat to the front room

the high tongue and groove ceiling above 

with the long wire white bulb extinguished 

to sleep as the cicadas from sand emerge

to sing the song long into the nocturne 

the song of how yellow flies the time

no amount of swat the sting assuage 

ever more from Florida sands to swarm.