Lured back to the hive after a heist gone bad,
a pair of pollen smugglers ignore
the bright chaos, their crimes darken the sky.

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Honey bee | Apis mellifera

Wooed by gravity, she closes
her eyes and falls from heaven
as the sun dazzles her wings.

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Sparrow | Passer domesticus

As part of Canton’s Acts of Culture Week, I’m giving a presentation of my wildlife art., and signing copies of my new book, Step Gently Out.
It will be 7pm, Tuesday, May 1 at the Canton Public Library, located at 1200 S. Canton Center Rd., Canton, MI 48188.
“In celebration of Canton’s Acts of Culture Week, we are pleased to present photographer Rick Lieder as he shares his beautiful book, “Step Gently Out”, an amazing ‘picture’ of what we can find in our own backyards if we just step gently and keep …

Cobwebs shiver with her tiniest move,
a mantis nymph rules an underworld
ready for a brutal reckoning,
the next instar a far-off dream.

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Praying mantis | Tenodera aridifolia sinensis

Waiting for the blade to bend,
stranded on a windblown space tower,
a beetle on the lam
moves with chaotic grace.

She bends others to her will
with a splash of red,
leaving hallucinations and memories
of the wind’s wild side.

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Cardinal | Cardinalis cardinalis

In the shadow of a blue moon,
a firefly cages unruly atoms,
summer heat struggling to break free.

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Firefly | Lampyridae | Photinus pyralis

Shaking herself awake,
a lacewing preens, her golden eye
scanning a world where
nothing new has happened in years.

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Golden-eyed Lacewing | Chrysopa oculata

The book trailer for Step Gently Out was featured on The Daily Beast blog:

A bee peers out from a noir mystery,
listening for her Queen, still tempted
by the dark delights in the garden.

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Honey bee | Apis mellifera