The Locust

Its hot voice sizzles from some cool tree
Near-by:
It seems to burn its way through the air
Like a small, pointed flame of sound
Sharpened on the ecstatic edge of sunbeams.

This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on July 16, 2022, by the Academy of American Poets.

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“The Locust” first appeared in Poetry XVI, no. IV (July 1920), and later in Speyer’s first collection of poems, A Canopic Jar (E. P. Dutton & Company, 1921). Through synesthesia, Speyer’s speaker links the distinctive sound of the locusts to the feeling of summer heat.