Strange Matings
Pool party at the artists’ colony
At dusk the small frogs at the pool’s edge meet
to match their talents and to find a mate,
regardless of the odds or restless feet
that dangle where they hope to copulate.
He who trills loudest wins, and loudest stuns
damp swimmers toweling off after a dive,
the frogs’ slim throats expanding like balloons
of bubble gum that don’t explode. They strive
but sit politely, practicing their art
(each occupies a small space all his own),
but when a female picks her counterpart,
grim-faced yet touched by song, a splash! They’re gone,
locked in a love-clasp that’s a lot like ours,
except it’s buoyant, calm, and lasts for hours.
Ned Balbo‘s six books include The Cylburn Touch-Me-Nots (New Criterion Prize) and 3 Nights of the Perseids (Richard Wilbur Award), whose title poem also appears in the anthology Outer Space: 100 Poems (Midge Goldberg, ed.). The Trials of Edgar Poe and Other Poems received the Donald Justice Prize and the 2012 Poets’ Prize. He’s taught in Iowa State’s MFA program in creative writing and environment and received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts (translation), the Maryland Arts Council, and the Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation. New poems and a feature interview conducted by Stephen Kampa appear in Able Muse 31 (Winter 2023/2024). He is married to poet Jane Satterfield. Visit https://nedbalbo.com (poems) or https://nedsdemos.bandcamp.com (music).