Perhaps you've been wandering in your yard or your neighborhood lately, and have looked down to see what instantly strikes you as the biggest beetle EVER.
Congratulations: You've just found the source of that amazing, swelling, chirping noise that overtakes us in late July and August.
This is cicada season, which some folks regard as "locust" season, but that's something else altogether, and never mind right now. Cicadas abound. They live and mate high in the trees, thrive for a month and then die after they've left a new generation.
It's common to find dessicated husks about this time of year. Less common is to find a nice intact example like the one that died on my porch. I found it just after the rain, when the water on its transparent wings glistened like ice. I did not capture said glistening here, but I did get a decent grasp of the intricacies of wing and exoskeleton.
As I drew it, I was thinking about Albrecht Durer's fantastic Rhinoceros woodcut. Not emulating it, understand, but thinking about his luxury of detail.
This is what happens. One day you start doodling in a sketchbook, and the next day you're picking dead things up off the porch.
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1 comments:
These are gorgeous, Karen. I love the sound of cicadas, it reminds me of places I have loved like - New Mexico and Provence in the summer. We heard some around here not too long ago - I wonder if that's proof of global warming?
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