Diary of a Maggot
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By
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Robert T. Jeschonek
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Did you ever wo nder what maggot s are singing about as we squirm through a swath of rancid meat? As we nibble the steaming feast, growing fatter with each delicious bite?
It's a secret.
All I'm allowed to tell you is that it's the same song we've sung since the beginning of maggots. The same beautiful tune that has lilted through countless trash dumps, graves, fields, marshes, and homes throughout the countless eons.
And we're singing it again tonight as we comb through this bag of rotten refuse. As I and my hundreds of brothers, freshly hatched from M other's eggs , devour the precious food we need to thrive.
This is paradise. The air inside the plastic bag is rank and humid. We move in absolute darkness, the only sound our twitching and nibbling.
And singing.
Here we are, side by side, working hard for a common purp ose. Working to eat and grow and change and become mothers and fathers ourselves. Can there be any more perfect happiness?
I'm writing my own song about it as I feed, composing it in my mind. A song about the Good Work At Hand and the Dream of Flight. That one thing I long for above al l others: to lift off, to soar . Soon, I will have it, we all will. We were born to take flight.
And eating is the only way to reach that reward. That's why I wriggle my tiny white body over the rough skin of the carcass, nibbling off pungent mouthfuls en route . Working my way up to the face , I make a bull's-eye for the tender, juicy eyeballs. When I squirm under the lid of one eye fo r a taste, the lid sticks to my body and moves with me--up as I move forward, then down as I back out. If one of his fellow people could see him right now, they'd think the dead man was winking at them, back from the dead.
Suddenly, my meal is interrupted. S omeone whistles a warning from afar. One of the lookouts. Danger! Danger!
We all freeze at once. We lie still in the sweet rotting meat , listening for a sign, wondering if the alarm is false.
It isn't. Heavy thuds resound above us, crossing overhead. We hear them descend, coming closer, clomping toward us.
Suddenly, bright light flares through the thin plastic shell of the bag. Night becomes day in our sticky, sweet paradise.
Panic flickers through our family like lightning. A united, keening cry rises inside the bag from my brothers and sisters: Mother, help us!
Even thought we all know Mother isn't coming back. That she's flown away forever.
The thudding sounds come ever closer. I shiver and whimper a little myself , feeling chills of fear ripple through me.
And then I change my tune. I gather myself up and prepare for what's coming, whatever that might be. I'm determined not to let anything stand between me and my destiny, my dreamed-of soaring.
Boom boom boom. The thudding comes closer than ever and stops. I sense movement beyond the bag, and I know instantly what it is.
The movement of living meat. Something not-dead come to pay us a call.
The tiniest maggot of the litter, barely half my size, scoots up and crushes her body against mine. She's shaking uncontrollably , her chirping whistle fluttering with terror . I hum a little tune, comforting her as best I can.
We hear the thudding sounds again. Boom boom boom. Coming closer. BOOM BOOM BOOM. We feel the vibrations as they crash down outside the bag.
And stop. Stop right there beside us.
Everyone freezes. The tiniest maggot is a block of stone against me.
Then, I sense that movement of not-dead meat again...and the bag jolts upward. My brothers and sisters wail as the heavy load shifts.
I hear thunderous sounds o utside--some kind of language?--b ut I don't understand. "Time to get rid of you, old man."
The bag lurches up again and swings backward. Thrown from my perch on the skin, tossed away from the tiniest maggot, I roll down through the splintered bones of the carcass and land in a pool of coppery ooze. I get a mouthful and drink it down
Â
By
Â
Robert T. Jeschonek
Â
Did you ever wo nder what maggot s are singing about as we squirm through a swath of rancid meat? As we nibble the steaming feast, growing fatter with each delicious bite?
It's a secret.
All I'm allowed to tell you is that it's the same song we've sung since the beginning of maggots. The same beautiful tune that has lilted through countless trash dumps, graves, fields, marshes, and homes throughout the countless eons.
And we're singing it again tonight as we comb through this bag of rotten refuse. As I and my hundreds of brothers, freshly hatched from M other's eggs , devour the precious food we need to thrive.
This is paradise. The air inside the plastic bag is rank and humid. We move in absolute darkness, the only sound our twitching and nibbling.
And singing.
Here we are, side by side, working hard for a common purp ose. Working to eat and grow and change and become mothers and fathers ourselves. Can there be any more perfect happiness?
I'm writing my own song about it as I feed, composing it in my mind. A song about the Good Work At Hand and the Dream of Flight. That one thing I long for above al l others: to lift off, to soar . Soon, I will have it, we all will. We were born to take flight.
And eating is the only way to reach that reward. That's why I wriggle my tiny white body over the rough skin of the carcass, nibbling off pungent mouthfuls en route . Working my way up to the face , I make a bull's-eye for the tender, juicy eyeballs. When I squirm under the lid of one eye fo r a taste, the lid sticks to my body and moves with me--up as I move forward, then down as I back out. If one of his fellow people could see him right now, they'd think the dead man was winking at them, back from the dead.
Suddenly, my meal is interrupted. S omeone whistles a warning from afar. One of the lookouts. Danger! Danger!
We all freeze at once. We lie still in the sweet rotting meat , listening for a sign, wondering if the alarm is false.
It isn't. Heavy thuds resound above us, crossing overhead. We hear them descend, coming closer, clomping toward us.
Suddenly, bright light flares through the thin plastic shell of the bag. Night becomes day in our sticky, sweet paradise.
Panic flickers through our family like lightning. A united, keening cry rises inside the bag from my brothers and sisters: Mother, help us!
Even thought we all know Mother isn't coming back. That she's flown away forever.
The thudding sounds come ever closer. I shiver and whimper a little myself , feeling chills of fear ripple through me.
And then I change my tune. I gather myself up and prepare for what's coming, whatever that might be. I'm determined not to let anything stand between me and my destiny, my dreamed-of soaring.
Boom boom boom. The thudding comes closer than ever and stops. I sense movement beyond the bag, and I know instantly what it is.
The movement of living meat. Something not-dead come to pay us a call.
The tiniest maggot of the litter, barely half my size, scoots up and crushes her body against mine. She's shaking uncontrollably , her chirping whistle fluttering with terror . I hum a little tune, comforting her as best I can.
We hear the thudding sounds again. Boom boom boom. Coming closer. BOOM BOOM BOOM. We feel the vibrations as they crash down outside the bag.
And stop. Stop right there beside us.
Everyone freezes. The tiniest maggot is a block of stone against me.
Then, I sense that movement of not-dead meat again...and the bag jolts upward. My brothers and sisters wail as the heavy load shifts.
I hear thunderous sounds o utside--some kind of language?--b ut I don't understand. "Time to get rid of you, old man."
The bag lurches up again and swings backward. Thrown from my perch on the skin, tossed away from the tiniest maggot, I roll down through the splintered bones of the carcass and land in a pool of coppery ooze. I get a mouthful and drink it down
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