You fly like a man drowning. Frantically
paddling, wings out of sync, legs akimbo, worried faces. Trajectory: downward.
Down on to the stillness of your back.
Our natural reactions are to stay motionless — completely still — in the
face of danger. But being on your back at the bottom of Lewisham station
stairwell is not where you evolved to be. Lewisham evolved around you. While
you crept out at night from the dead wood pile, drunk on hormones and ready to
wrestle, a city was built around you. Concrete towers grew tall and were
felled. Metal and glass towers grew in their place. You stayed.
We guard you. People rush past, fear of the beetle in their eyes. We flip
you the right way with our tickets. Your grappling hook feet still thrash for
grip. Your movements jerky, like a clockwork toy that can’t quite get going.
Antennae waving — four points on the end, like fingers reaching out to hold
onto air. Between your shields, gilt edges.
Down the stairs comes the only other person not afraid. He looks at us.
Nice stag beetle, he says. They’re rare now. We shepherd you to the edge. The
bright lights behind you, the thick dark night of the undergrowth ahead. Your
antlers twitch.
Stephen Rutt 