Saturday, March 13, 2010

Firefly Spell

When we got to a clearing - beyond the point where we'd left the highway- you tugged my elbow and whispered “look”-I lifted my head looking up to a near absolute blackness.

Then I saw the fireflies. Fast spirals in and out of sight- I watched them tuck into the silence of trees to return, spin, tumble and increase. Tens became thousand – I could not count them.

A second time you whispered- "Breathe" I exhaled and let my feet root to wet earth and my eyes expand to blue-white sparks that came close enough to touch-

I can't say why but I grew anxious and you took my hand, asked me to give it just a moment longer, to open up just a little bit more – Then I felt a release-

A succession of slips, phosphorous ghost glows twisted from within my skull and out through both eyes. memory and lies, bits of laughter chains of events and voices of long dead friends, all gone and out!

Then your third whisper lifted me up, held me suspended, and brought me back down to your side. How long had we been here? And what issued from me into this night's wet blackness. . .

Your silence told me that now was no time for talking. Not just now.

March 13, 2010