American Crocodile
Crocodylus Actus

Even before she slits the egg she is
groaning, taking on vegetable heat.
The leaves of the nest are rank
with decay. Coiled in the egg,
Buddha enclosed in herself,
striped yellow from eyelid to back.

Since the melt of glaciers, she has
followed the sun in its circle,
unable to turn around.

At the edge of water, she basks,
sliding in on her armored belly,
waving that ponderous tail.
Fed to repletion she roars,
the genius of that noise
making the surface dance.

Barbara Helfgott Hyett