L ADYBUG

when i was young i stole a ladybug from a small garden on the side of my great gr andmother’s home . i lay her in a plastic container with tufts of gr ass she slept in a dr awer in my closet. she was all alone , but that was because she was special, because she was the ladybug that i chose to love , brought into my own. the next day i dropped a splash of water next to her bed. it could be a puddle or an ocean or dr inking water, but it was for her and it was my best. a few days later she lay upside down, her feet crooked in the air, her wings dr y and faded. do you think her body remains in my front yard? i hope she knows that i loved her the best i could, and i hope you know that, too, that i loved you with the gr ace i could spare , in the home i thought you needed. i am sor r y my love was so unr uly, though it swaddled you when it could, lighting candles with its lightning, r ipping r iver s into r aindrops. for give this elegy of misguided metaphor s. my ladybug, i think you have for given, for i know you are at home in the soil, but i am sor r y i locked you away and bound your wings and loved you like i knew what i was doing.