Ode to the Dwarf Wedgemussel

You’re cute as a biggish button,
bronze glints glimpsed in a sandy bed,
hiding your glistening quicksilver.

You’re a freshwater workhorse,
cleaning out metals and algae,
fish acting as your cabbage patch*.

Out in the mist of the breezy bay,
you’re needed too. Otherwise,
the future would be a redrock desert.

~~~

The Dwarf Wedgemussel is one of the endangered species in the Chesapeake Bay. The threats began in the 1800s when they were used for making buttons.
Inspired by a Paint Chip prompt and linked to dVerse.

* In the “old days” some children were told they were brought by storks, and others were “found in the cabbage patch.” The mussel’s young, called Glochidia, attach to fish, without which they could not survive.