after Andy Weir’s Project Hail Mary

The baby mosquitos are little aliens on the computer screen.
“There’s the siphon,” the professor points to a tubular vessel
that brings fresh air to the larvae’s tracheids.
Most of the larvae are still, dead, the better for us to study them.
One squirms, translucent brush bristles where I think a mouth
should be.  It’s filter feeding, passive, slurping
up particles I can’t see
while their brethren float in stagnant insecticide.
The survivor may as well be an astronaut
adrift in a crewless ship through a foreign solar system.
The microscope’s light is a new sun burning.
I hope they can see the glow.