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| Hyalinobatrachium dianae |
A frog nobody knew existed
appeared among the raindrops
in the foothills sloping down
toward the Caribbean.
It had been there all along,
as the Golden toad was dying,
as the Harlequin toad was losing
its forest, and while ultraviolet light
washed into the brightly
colored skins of tree frogs
and dart frogs, any one of which
would barely register
on the scale that weighs losses
until it becomes the last
and its call no longer
brings the nights to life.
The glassfrog is an inch of green
when it wraps its toes around
a narrow stem, and seen
from underneath, its heart
is visible through the transparent
skin, transmitting a signal back
up to the stars.
David Chorlton was born in Austria, grew up in Manchester, England, and lived for several years in Vienna before moving to Phoenix in 1978. In September, 2015, he will participate as a poet in the Fires of Change exhibition at the Coconino Center for the Arts in Flagstaff (Sponsored by the Southwest Fire Science Consortium, the Landscape Conservation Initiative, and the National Endowment for the Arts.)