Ode to RodneyMiller

You grind nasty bugs into paste –  
Or at least you used to.  
Your informants and collaborators sustain you.  
Are you just along for the ride?  
You tell yourself you’re retired  
And perhaps you are.  
 
A hero and an anti-hero,  
A comic book character  
Who threatens,  
But is non-threatening.  
Your gnashing teeth menace evil-doers,  
Afraid to test your mettle.  
 
You have nettles,  
That cannot be removed  
Without getting your fingers pricked.  
Big pricks abound.  
It’s a Pacific Rimjob,  
A not unpleasant reminder of past glories.  
 
What of Love?  
Is there a Mrs. InsectGrinder?  
There used to be
An inspiration,  
Now only haunting, teasing --  
Still softening the wrath in absentia.  
 
Trickle, Trickl, Trikl, Trkl.  
Slips away, but surges back.  
Morph, Orphan, Phantasm, Asmodues (or  Asmar?).  
Reinvention, innovation, Visioning.  
A quest for self and connection.  
The past is illusory.  
 
Smearing Fireflies is thrilling,  
But falling stars are at least meteors  
And are ignored at peril.  
Squish, splat, decapitate.  
Slice, gouge, disembowel.  
You are what you dismember.