Scale Insects

Beginning with arms and legs
but after a while
degenerate
like TV addicts
helplessly glued to the spot—
unboundaried consumers
of the sap of other lives.
Yet scale insects create
manna—nurturer
of ants, bees, humans—
and the resin that lacquers
inlaid wood; they add
to the shine
and sweetness of things.
Ground beads, worn
in the Bahamas, gleam
round fossil females
that might have produced
a million of themselves,
parthenogenically—
not even noticing.