The Moths

I spoke of the crickets in the kitchen

but limitless are the wonders of an old house

I speak now on the moths

Several weeks ago a study was released by NASA

then augmented and ornamented by tabloids

but my mother doesn’t need sensational claims of alternate dimensions

she’s known all along they were there

because of the moths in the kitchen

Try visually following the flight of a moth

You won’t be able to entirely, I assert

She’ll flicker in and out, disappearing and reappearing to your right or left

Attracted to electric light, all the more if it blinks like her wings

I’ve seen Stranger Things

Moths are creatures of night, of the lights made bright in the night

but moths are not 3D

Possessing abilities we’ve not yet attained despite all our effort

but ignored at best, resented at average, and despised at worst,

moths effortlessly hover in and out

revering their blinking light and subtle, velvety display

They fly from behind me, emerging, evidently, from the smooth plaster of my wall

Hiding their travels in plain sight

True masters of disguise and stealth, yet asking only for bread, maybe some fabric

Were we to share their ability, we would not airily glide among our worlds, taking only a bit of cake and cotton

We would revel in the warcraft of it

Far from the serene subtly she presents

We would instigate oppression with the careless manner of a moth floating breezily through a lamp-lit living room 

What is all this to say?

With the unhurried confidence of a showy fox or subtle moth

We have so much un-mastered

And even more unobserved