A Bunch

I'll try to finish what I started later this week. Here's a poem and a picture.

The Bag Lady

The bag lady

jumped when Vito
screamed, then looked
around & laughed.
“Is that all?”  she said.
“A crawdad with a stinger?”

The lady pulled up

her coat sleeves, watching
as the stinger circled,
more flexible than she
anticipated.  “I got a pair
of gloves,” Vito said.

They trapped the scorpion

inside a jar.  Vito lifted
the rim & squirted lighter
fluid.  The scorpion struck
at the blue, plastic tip.
Its dance couldn’t stop
the carbon or the flames.

The bag lady

said grace & knifed open
the scorched thorax
& forked out the meat.
“I know it’s an insect,” she
said, “but with pepper
& hot sauce it’s just like
a first cousin.”