Forget the Warts

The toads demand attention. Perched at the brink between
puddle and grass, their horny screams rattle the atmosphere,
throat sacs billowed like balloons. The morning is just a baby,
three hours old, but it’s go time—toad time to the amphibians.

You and I sacrifice our circadian rhythm for skies speckled with
firefly freckles. We are intruders of the night, civil creatures gone
feral. As our shoes squelch through gravel sludge, we scrunch
sleeves to elbows, seeking eyes hidden among mud and leaves.

You there! You cup your palms around a bellowing lad and play
hot potato—don’t let the toad go—games while I search for his
mate. The damp ground breathes with moth-wing flickers and
cricket chirps. A frog the size of my fingernail slips underwater

with the weight of a sigh. Rubbing my pruning eyes with grimy
fingers, I follow flirting calls of lust. At last, we place our lucky
man adjacent to his true love—forced proximity, how romantic.
You and I wait for a kiss of frog prince magic, but both parties

dissociate, gazes slack from indifference. You fools! Is this not
what they sought? We pick dandelion weeds, singing soft tunes
of passion, yielding no reaction. It isn’t until we turn our backs
that the pair bellows a different call: the toads reject attention.