The Two of Us

Every summer, walking the dirt farm road

past a shallow pond, a lone black horsefly

buzzing, circling low, diving in to slice

my back or legs while I try to swat her away.

If I connect, bat to ball, she leaves me alone

until the next walk. If she cuts me,

spongy mouthpart that sops up my blood,

protein to feed her eggs.

The sound of her puts me on eternal time,

as if I’ll always walk this same trail,

the same fly always my familiar.

After forty years, a touchstone of summer.

Is it strange to care about a creature

that means to wound me? Yet I do,

not the noise or threat of pain,

but continuance. The hula-hoop circles

of her flight. My improving aim.