A Cricket Dies In My Arms

A cricket gets into my house. I hear it for two days but I can't find it to save it. Is it in the walls? The sink? I can't say. But now, it's morning number three for Cricket, and I finally find my little leggy friend, but Cricket is quiet now, and dying alone on the bathroom floor. 

"Hi cricket," I say sweetly. "Stay right there, and I'll get a cup to scoop you up and put you outside, where you can eat and drink." 

I am as naked as my Cricket, so I go through the preparation process of putting on shorts and then cracking open the front door. 

I grab a red cup and I place it over Cricket. I slide a piece of paper under the cup, trapping Cricket in the cup, and I walk Cricket outside and set them free in the yard.

"There you go," I say. "You look very pretty."

But Cricket is barely moving. I'm too late. Cricket is in their final moment of life as a cricket.

Cricket has no legacy that I am aware of. No family that I know of. As far as I know, all Cricket has is me, bearing witness to their existence on this crowded planet of first and final breaths, disappearing in the wind.

I smile at Cricket and say goodbye, while the fresh June sun glints on my green and gray little Cricket at rest under a tree where crickets play.