Dragonfly Dogfight

by Peter Wyton

Dark doings in the Lost Gardens

Blue Leader to Heligan Control, good evening,
airborne from my favourite take-off point
amongst the Millennium Pink water lilies,
climbing to cruise altitude in patrol zone,
anything to report? Over. Heligan to Blue,
weather reports favourable. No other traffic
aloft in your immediate vicinity. Perhaps
a performance of pipistrelle aerobatics
as the shadows lengthen. There are rumours
concerning a Vagrant Emperor dragonfly
inbound from the Mevagissey Harbour area,
but there’s nothing visible on radar. Over.
Blue Leader to Heligan, copied your weather
and intelligence concerning interloper.
Dashed foreigners. Always sticking their antennae
in where it’s not … Heligan to Blue Leader.
Advisory. Unidentified flying object on your tail,
closing at a great rate of knots. Take evasive…
..Graunch, graunch.. Mayday, mayday.. Chomp, chomp..
…action. I’m getting an awful lot of interference.
Blue from Heligan, Are you O.K.? Come in. Over.
Heligan Control from Vagrant Emperor, sorry
about all that. Mother always brought me up
never to talk with my mouth full. Over.
Heligan Control to Vagrant Emperor, what have
You done to Blue Leader, you wicked anisoptera?
Vagrant Emperor to Heligan Control, he tasted
scrumptious. This is nature, pal. Live with it.
Permission to land amongst the lobelias?
Over and out.

More poetry from Peter Wyton in The Chimaera — http://www.the-chimaera.com/March2010/Theme/Poems/Wyton.html