Ecdysis

In the summer, the trees scream with cicadas
and their amber shells speckle the trees.
Few of us ever see one emerging.
But we’ve imagined them inside and wondered
how they squeeze out through the neat split
in the back. And suppose we did the same.
Imagine your neighborhood studded
with the fragile statuary of shed skins.
One of them looks familiar, and you knock
on the neighbor’s door to find out
how they’ve changed and what they expect
this stage of their lives has armed them for.