Insects Ball

words | john riccardi art | patrick rocard music | jason lai

Here comes Mr. Spider, slinking on a single thread, looking his finest in a top hat and spats. His back shines pearly black. He's garbed for glory in that silky scarf, determined to impress, woo, and caress a little someone. To what dalliance is he skittering off? We see glitter on the knob on his cane, a flash from the cleats on his pumps, and a sparkle where he vanishes in the evening. Then the smoothie is sped. Ah, there is news: three boozy crickets lurching together in a perambulating lean-to. Burps, chirps, and snatches of maudlin song leak from the dissolute trio. They are early jetsam from a wild, fancy party. One halts to divest itself of over-drink, sparking chuckles and belches in the others. Here, Mr. Spider is back. Miss Ladybird adorns his arm. She is draped with the skimpiest, sheerest, spotted diaphane. Her iridescent boa entwines her escort as well as herself. The crickets ballyhoo. They find the couple's evident hurry hilarious. Up go the pair on a racy dragonfly. Nothing less sensational would do for their tryst.

A shadow wheels above, spins and drops. The crickets squelch their snickering, cut short their guffaws and their smirks. It is Mrs. Spider, a big, blowsy, brown scorcher with a filthy disposition. She's after her husband, that bounder. Her spiderlings wait in the nest. Abscond he may, she will ravel his trace like a skein. She mounts a tandem of scuttling beetles and drives toward the festivity's din. The three idle roisterers breath more easily, go chortling and slapping at the fuzzy sides of a wobbly caterpillar.

The party is an outright bash. All in the insect kingdom, from eminence to menial, cleric to roustabout, are rubbing leg to leg, thorax to thorax. Yet, a subtle droning lacks: there

is a buzz amiss. Where are the flies? Uproar shakes the celebration. Cruel, callous birds, like feathered bombardiers, have launched a surreptitious raid upon the revellers. The congregation scatters; the party dissolves beneath the aerial attack. A straggler wonders why the flies never arrived.

Mr Spider reappears, somewhat dishevelled and mightily self-contented. Not all his shoes have been done up. Mrs. Spider is upon him. Miscreant! Reprobate! She swears he'll satisfy her as to his prior whereabouts that night or be pilloried. Scurrilous Mr Spider holds out an empty hat to insist with a sta-stammer that he has been hunting flies for a morning treat, although with nothing to show for it. Mrs. Spider bundles him off. Given his antecedents, he'll have remonstrance for breakfast, strictures thereafter, and won't be seen for days. Flies indeed!

Those creatures, the absent invitees, had counted upon the drunken fuss distracting the others so that they might hold their own, quiet congregation. While the rest had been frittering and fluttering at the gala, the flies had grouped into a greeny-black, winking raft of wings, aligning compound eyes to settle internal matters. They were a frugal, parsimonious lot who looked with dour disapproval at gaudy abandon, and shunned the immodest displays indulged in by the rest. The flies took stock, assigned responsibilities, and planned for the interval after which they would meet again. The date would be set to coincide with the next insect ball, when as always the others would begin merrily, then finish badly as they deserved. The flies, meanwhile, would be attending to business.