A sun bleached lime-green bathing suit, bronzed boy,
unshod against cut-glass buried in the muck.

Two fretted steps into the swamp, the center                             
of the scent of snakes. In one hand a tenderly dead frog.  

Immobile, statuesque shin deep in copper water,
hand stiffened at arm’s length, drops the frog.                              

Calm, hot, dry and long mid-August day.                            
Frog thought to be no longer entertaining.  

At impact the corpse plops a vacuum  
in the face of stagnant water.                             

Quickly the hole is a mouth snapped shut.                          
Shock waves send perfectly round crests and troughs  

propagating at the perfect speed required
to keep each wave perfectly round.            

Through reeds as a ghost would slip          
and immediately rejoin the wave.  

Questioning: Is this ripple really after-shock?
Yes, he can call it anything, it will look the same.    
 
Whether it begins when water is pushed away,
or it starts as water rushes back to fill the hole,    

cannot be discerned. Lime green bronze ponders  
the possibilities; probing for another frog.