Sunday Stew: Lament for a Moth

by T. Clear

Lost, to a single point of electric light,
you surrendered to a false moon

in ever-diminishing circles,
spiraled to an end on a sidewalk

outside the Hummingbird Saloon.
And then trampled by someone's urgency

for Doritos. No dirge
to attend the last sputtering dust

from your two pairs of wings.
Not a bee or fly to hover vigil.

Never to know the straight line,
the perfect angle by which to navigate

along the horizon by moonlight,
by gene-encoded directionals

spun through egg, larva, pupa
for 190 million years. To end here,

swept aside in a twirl of wind,
more weightless than ever

minus your own spark of desire.
O my nocturnal, my less-than-lovely,

my little lepidopteron, where
will you not go now?