Detritus: Close Encounters of the Small Kind

I have a friend who sees beauty in the bits of nature that most of us pass by or trample over and sweep away – chips of dry fallen leaves, torn and faded petals, tiny feathers, bits of broken rock, mini-twigs – detritus. I can hear my friend saying detritus with a gleam of passion in her eyes, a love for the detail most of us never even notice. Detritus. She sees beauty in it and draws its intricate patterns slowly, carefully, lovingly with the sharpest pencil lead and the finest-tipped pen. She’s an artist.

A piece of detritus appeared in my kitchen window this week, hanging there like a small suncatcher. When I took a closer look, I saw that it was a leafy lacework more or less the shape of a star a quarter-inch wide. It had ragged, irregular outer edges and framed an open center, a circle evenly trisected by miniscule spokes that made the tiny object look like a star-framed peace symbol. An almost invisible spider-silk holds it in place, and it sways ever so slightly in the breeze. I got the sharpest pencil I could find and drew it. Then I let it be.