Dragonfly

The dragonfly is very much a creature of the air and of the sun. Although it has legs, which are spine-bordered and bunched forward, so it can cling and climb, it never walks. But in the air, a dragonfly is as graceful as a ballet dancer, while it swoops, turns, and zooms about at will. It can dive like a small plane, or hover like a helicopter, as long as the sun is shining. The dragonfly has eyes that contain as many lenses as the eyes of several thousand men. Its head is attached to the slender body in a way that the dragonfly can turn its head almost completely around, so it can see below as well as above him. The wings, which are veined and transparent, can move as much as twenty-eight times a second, carrying it through the air at speeds of about sixty miles an hour.
The nymphs of the dragonfly, which usually live in water, are carnivores, even devouring each other and destroying newly emerged adults before their wings had a chance to harden and fly off into the sun. Most smaller dragonfly nymphs spend a year in the water, the larger varieties can be there for as long as two to three years. The transformation from underwater nymph to dragonfly is amazing. Usually it happens in the heat of the day, with a few exceptions. The wet dragonfly climbs from the water and clings to the bank, or a stick, or weed. As it does so, the suit of chitin armor splits and the damp, crumpled wings unfold. Then, as the glistening coat hardens in the bright sunshine, the dragonfly darts into the air, leaving behind a brown translucent shell. As much a miracle of Nature, as the transformation of a butterfly. The adult dragonfly has a short life span. It lives just long enough to mature and mate. Usually the first cold of fall kills them off. Only the nymphs remain in their underwater home, carrying on the chain of life, just as they had in the long ago past. For a dragonfly, life and death are simple and direct, and the glittering wings cease beating in the numbing of autumn cold. But through the miracle of Nature, the nymphs will again shed their armor, and take to wing in the sunshine, and we will once again reap the benefit of their voracious appetites.
Yesterday morning I witnessed the slow death of a dragonfly and – while taking these photos - I felt an uncomfortable amount of guilt.