Nature Girl was happy; she'd spent the Labor Day weekend laboring under the golden rays of the sun removing overgrowth and reshaping the kidney-shaped bed, restoring the glory of the butterfly bushes flanking the fountain. Flowers, greenery and water elements once again were in balance. She even found a few new buddies. "Praying mantis, how exciting," she exclaimed!
"What a wonderful garden paradise I have!" In the cool morning she would amble over to the garden, looking for her new stick-like friends living in harmony with bees, monarch butterfly and assorted other bugs besides the burbling fountain. "Hello, babies," she would coo to her new mantis friends. Even when she found one of the new babies on the block sucking life out of a moth's face. "It's OK, it's nature, and it's wonderful," she said.
First a bumble bee buzzed Nature Girl's foot and left a stinging reminder; then the Praying Mantis showed their true colors: green really stood for PREY-ing Mantis, as the once-tranquil solace of serenity turned to into a garden of death. The floor of what had been a home for hospitality was now littered with the corpses of mighty monarchs, wings cast aside by the unfeeling cruelty of Mantis finding the backyard buffet is always open for breakfast.
Look at the joy of my new green buddywith eyes so wide and skin so green.
Who could imagine coming to the garden
would leave the paradise a place wiped clean?
What a wonderful creature the Mantis is,
chomping on a friend.
Smiling and praying over every meal
from start to untimely end.
Now Nature Girl is moving the babies off the block, eyeing greenery in the verdant forest behind the garden. The Palace of Patience must now be closely managed under the newly-watchful eye of Nature Girl.
You should write childrens books. There aren't enough of them where the main character gets eaten in the end.
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