The Point of Devastation

The day after the election, I wake up feeling like the old cartoon coyote, splayed on steaming asphalt with an anvil on my chest and the rest of me emptied flat.

My friend texts. She cannot sit around like this. I cannot get up like this. But when she mentions going to a pick-your-own flower garden to breathe in the spicy perfumes of fall blooms, I agree to put on pants.

As I drive to meet her, the sky puts on a show. Ahead, plentiful dark clouds are lined with glowing shimmers, as though each one’s silver lining is burning white-hot while storms gather within. It’s a lovely fall day in Southwest Virginia. The rolling, watercolored mountains are so stunning they must not have yet read the news.

I’ve moved back to my hometown nestled in the Blue Ridge, and I’ve not yet been here, to this postcard-sized oasis near the old farm where, in autumns long past, my family bought apple cider made of liquid gold. In the spring, we’d clunk down the mountain on this same road to go see newborn piglets, who just now squirm into my memory for the first time in ages. So pink, so new. Their barrel-shaped mothers lying in the mud.

After Nicole’s SUV kicks up gravel and slows to a stop, she and I share a long hug that holds everything our country is feeling. We head toward the tiny patch of land that seems to have been curated just for our fingers. I rustle through thick and thriving stems as well as dying stalks, brown leaves dripping downward, to find colorbursts where I can. It’s November, after all. Frigid mornings are on their way.

Such quiet, as we build our beauty.

With messy, leafy bouquets in our hands, we meet again at the trimming table, where we arm ourselves with shears to rid the superfluous. I hate to see the green leaves fall to my feet. They had just been living there, not bothering anyone. What right do I have to choose their worthiness?

I cut. Something catches Nicole’s eye and she says how gorgeous in such a spellbound way that I’m pulled to her. What I first judge a butterfly is, I see as I get closer, a large moth. A perfect creature. It rests on the neighboring fence, wings spread open, colors intricate and bold. Imperfect black spots on bone-colored underwings, with surprise pops of bright red hugging its black-striped body. I would decorate my house in this motif, I mutter, as Nicole says, Oh no. I think it’s a lanternfly.

Beautiful, I whisper loudly like a child, perhaps the very same child who stood near this spot fifty years ago captivated by piglets’ first steps.

No, she says, texting furiously. They’re dangerous. I instinctively take a step back, knowing I don’t possess the mental energy to deflect an insect attack on this of all days.

No, she says again, a giggle in her voice. Dangerous to trees, to plants. Lemme see what my friend says. Within minutes her friend the expert texts back, all caps and urgency: KILL IT!!!

I will later read that lanternflies, an invasive species, are ravaging crops and fruit trees and other plants to extents unseen in history, and once again find myself marveling at the universe and how I know so little when I’ve dedicated my life to learning so much.

I’ll read that lanternflies threaten livestock, farmers’ livelihoods. That local businesses may face millions of dollars in damage all because these virulent, opulent pests are out of control. I’ll read an internet user’s words about how, together, lanternflies possess the ability to cause endless damage to the point of devastation. Still. It feels wrong to destroy the most stunning creature I’ve ever seen.

I’ll only later understand that Nicole knew to crush this one animal for the sake of the greater good. My ignorance abetted.

After she picks up the watering can—the fatal blunt-force trauma weapon—I look at the mess of shell and twisted legs, smeared polka dots, and useless wings, and think It used to be so beautiful.

We submitted our e-payments and hugged goodbye. I drove home with the scent of earth in my nostrils as the clouds darkened and raindrops splatted on my windshield and I began to cry, a destructive yet impotent rage bubbling in my flattened heart against the unfairness of unspeakable evil in disguise.