Silence rushes back in, so absolute it leaves a bruise. The branch, now bare, sways gently. You pull your hand away from the glass. Your fingerprints are the only thing left on the window, and the air, for the first time all afternoon, feels empty. You are alone again. Just you, and the echo of a million wings.
Enjambre.
It begins as a hum on the edge of hearing, a vibration that lives not in the ear but in the sternum. A low, thrumming question mark. Then the first scout arrives, a speck of black against the white of the afternoon sky. Then another. Then a dozen. The air thickens. enjambre
Then, as if a switch has been thrown, the hum changes pitch. It rises. The beard on the branch shivers, loosens, and explodes back into a cloud. The enjambre lifts, a torn piece of shadow peeling away from the world. It drifts over the fence, past the neighbor’s chimney, and dissolves into the haze above the treeline. Silence rushes back in, so absolute it leaves a bruise
To watch a swarm settle is to witness a kind of violence. They do not land; they collapse onto the branch, each insect grappling for purchase, forming a pendulous beard of chitin and industry. The branch groans under a weight that seems impossible for such small things. The sun is occluded. The world behind them becomes a dappled, shifting darkness. Your fingerprints are the only thing left on