Treehoppers

Hunchbacks in flight
or buffalos high jumping;
bark chips, garish petals
edging along a leaf;
rose thorns, eerily bent
twigs sharp as coral …
Some have tar-coloured
antlers, dadaist arms hung
with a pawnbroker's sign;
others brandish shields,
raise circular arches,
mimic an animal's head:
all as if nature were
practising mutation, or had
bowed before the monstrous
and its fertility—
no point discernible
but a testing of limits;
rehearsals, mistakes
made on a miniscule scale
then left to proliferate;
the drainers and damagers
wearing their worst selves,
en route for the carnival.