Carnivorous Butterwort

A pale-purple tint – a sort of violet
of little petals attracting flies, ants

in fresh beeches shading the zigzag trail
with glossy moss. The floral colour
implies saintly piety to God or
deities at which an insect could quail

in the East. Ecru moths cruise and scurry.
Near Acheron just a halt. Plop-flop, slump
on still mucus. Their fine scales like tiny sequins
flowing to the pit. Drowned wings rapping a door

of a second realm. The blades suck up their blood
whose bodies are melted after bloom’s calm wait.
Insect’s love to the bright petals leads via its plight
to the Styx. In the next season, a next bud.

Hideko Sueoka is a poet and translator living in Tokyo. Her translation on photography “Shigeichi Nagano-Magazine Work 60s” was published in 2009. She was the winner of the 2013 Troubadour International Poetry Competition and her winning poem was highly commended in the Forward Prize 2014. Her debut poetry chapbook was published from Clare Songbirds Publishing House (New York State, US) in 2018. Her interest is traveling and bird watching.