Tadpoles & legionaries

We mostly made buildings
of different kinds of light
stolen from trees, river bent
and man-eating concrete culverts
the silver of Ariadne’s thread
stretched from crypt to bald-faced
waiting mountains, mercury temper
gathered in two cupped, prayerful hands
disdain transparent but distorting
with the descendant ripples 
of amphibians slipped
between numbed fingers
sloughing away
grey autumn mud, sheathing calves
as if wading rancid pools
beset by the warfare drone
of damsels and of dragonflies
made us legionaries 
languid as invasion
with all its noxious gifts
matted reeds as if
a holy child, in some regretful sacrifice
was abandoned here