Ornithorptera alexandrae

14/01/2021 –  Poem a Day Compilation



On broad wings

You carry the hopes

Of an entire species

Forever trapped

In delicate ecosystems

Encroached on daily

By inhuman beasts

That rip your homes

From before your eyes.



From plain to plateau

You search for food

Stripped from the land

For some convenience

Of those who care not

For such a queen as you,

Their interest only

In glittering wealth.



To catch a glimpse,

A glimmer, a shimmer,

Of wings of breadth

Greater than my hand

Which might wish to feel

The steps of tiny feet

Soaked in the perfume

Of the Kwila blossom

That you mate, your love,

Your majestic other

Should find so irresistible.



So exquisite in flight

No fear, save a spider’s web,

Of being captured

By creatures large or small;

Yet lowly now

Do their numbers fall,

A price on their existence

Increasing each day,

Their rarity their undoing.



For even with orders

Standing generations since,

Meant to protect

From nets and guns

That tore asunder

Those stunning wings

More delicate than silk,

They are placed on velvet,

Interred behind glass,

A hobby for an amateur

With more money to flash

Than any Alexandrine poet

Has written lines to mourn

Its passing into the tomes

Of the cruel and unjust history

Of homo sapien rule.