My moth flies well enough
yet cannot see its prison.

Instinctive and stubborn
beating walls with willful wings-
trapped by transparencies
unaccustomed to submitting.

Is breaking on hardened barriers-
savoring pride trapped in regrets,
better than a humbled turning,
and leaving by given exits?
So it seems, Moth-boy.

But, how valiant to watch!
Immolation of self/pride
around the globe, again, yet
left, finally, alone, inside.

Living these minutes
trapped in habits; the past
less than a foot from freedom,
entombed in opened glass.

I pretend disinterest
drawing another Camel Straight
I’m smoking my grief down
(just a cough, ignored and slight)

Other blackened lives
litter the Aladdin’s base
and my image, too,
pulled across the sooted glass

I note the flutters
and the weakening-
bound to die or
free to be leaving?

Still airborne, nearer the flame.
Hear the fateful singe!
The wick sputters;
and the fire is eating.

Life’s lanterns and all,
we only stay a while,
dumbly wasting the pain,
God knows, Moth and I.

 rjs