Thursday, July 12, 2012

Summer Night Lights


Fireflies

They light the tree tops
Far below we walk the country road darkness of unoccupied spaces
Broken only by the solar flares of approaching motors
That fly toward us with the recklessness of comets
And disappoint with the pointlessness of unknown quantities,
the solutions we missed in calculus class or particle physics,
Taking only our night vision in their wake

We begin again, carefully, neophytes of rustic night,
hugging the road’s edge
listening for the midnight murmurs of tanglewood trees
Our eyes hooded, our senses bagged by the unsophisticated dark,
We loop our artificial eye, a sloppy laser sword inexpertly wielded,
A likeness, perhaps, for some giant insect signboard of steadily emitted come-on
An ignorant offering to those with big ideas on their little minds

They flood toward us, drawn to the sly inducement of something big,
Cruising at treetop level, far above the little disturbances of plodding folk
They dip their lights toward us, a herd of tiny flashing eyes,
A Cyclopean race of night miners following the vein of generation
Sorry are we to disappoint so rich a flight of eager lantern-bearers,
our mineral light mere blindness for your affections
Lift up your lights, Fireflies! shining through our ruse

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