Cicada Chorus

The communal roar of the cicada chorus, a dynamo seventeen years in the making, and the individual buzzing and rustle of the periodical cicadas at Princeton Battlefield State Park. The thicket of understory and woods pictured, bordering a trail and a meadow, was the loudest, most active spot here on Thursday. The cicadas were flying, and sometimes landing on vertical things—like humans. One landed on my back and started crawling up. They tend to move up. Its science-fiction buzz near my ear was uncanny.