lanternfly city

i watch a friend kill the lanternfly nymphs.
their thumb to the shoulders of a milkweed plant.
crunched bodies. 
when they are not looking i save one
to ask him what he plans to do 
when he rules the world. 
the lanternfly is young & does not want
to talk about the swarm. instead he wants to talk
about the color of nectarines. he writes a poem
only i can see. we walk down to 
the slit throat of the city where
no one has enough air. he says that lanternflies
& humans are just as hungry as one another.
i believe that. i ask him what he thinks
the lanternfly city will look like
& he shrugs & says it will probably look
just about the same. the thought of staying the same
makes me ache. i want the bright transformation.
a city of wings. of cloud festivals 
& trees that crack the sidewalks open
& release colonies of ants. when you get
right down to it, a species is only a collar 
tethering us back to the most urgent needs.
a place to belong. a place to sing.
he tells me he never meant to come here.
that there are lanternflies who are in a place
some would call home. origin is a series
of deaths because to become your face,
you had to be cut & cut & cut. 
squashed mothers. little graveyards 
in the middle of corn fields. i find a tree
covered with the nymphs. they tell me
the city is already beginning. soon i will be
a lanternfly too. just as ravenous. just as lost.
we will have to re-paint our flesh. 
stand in the shadows of the oldest trees
& hope they remember what to do 
when you are living between species.