Tobacco Beetles
They spawn on a tobacco leaf,
A choice that ought to come to grief.
But …
Their eggs are weirdly suited for
A life inside a humidor.
Those perfect pinholes larvae drill
In panatellas (where they “chill”)
Mean they’re enjoying toxic feasts
With help from symbiotic yeasts
That line their guts and purify
The nicotine, so they don’t die.
Instead, they chew on, as they must,
Until they turn cigars to dust.
Black Widow Spiders
In widow’s black
We mourn the lack
Of trusting mates that won’t usurp us.
Of course, they’re dead
Because we fed
Upon them once they’d served their purpose.
Charlene E. Taber is both a former teacher of the deaf and a former proofreader for a newspaper publishing company. She holds master’s degrees in special education and linguistics. She has had a lifelong interest in insects and considers herself an amateur—not to mention frustrated!—entomologist. She and her husband have been married for 45 years. They have two grown sons, one grandson, and two dogs.