Damselfly, Trout, Heron

The damselfly folds its wings over its body when at rest. Captured, it should not be killed in cyanide, but allowed to die slowly: then the colors, especially the reds and blues, will last. In the hand it crushes easily into a rosy slime. Its powers of flight are weak. The trout feeds on the living damselfly. The trout leaps up from the water, and if there is sun you see the briefest shiver of gold, and then the river again. When the trout dies it turns its white belly to the mirror of the sky. The heron fishes for the trout in the gravelly shallows on the far side of the stream. The heron is the exact blue of the shadows the sun makes of trees on water. When you hold the heron most clearly in your eye, you are least certain it is there. When the blue heron dies, it lies beyond reach on the far side of the river.