She was always scared of moths when she was younger.
It wasn't their weak fluttering wings,
Or their lack of color,
Or the way they swarmed the porch light
Like pirates to it's gold glow.
It was the way that
When you crushed them,
There was no blood,
No sign of pain.
Only the thin film of dust sitting heavy on your palm,
Speaking in a dull whisper
Of the life you took,
And she was scared by that.
Because she never understood how easily a living thing could turn to nothing.
Until that day.
Until that boy,
Who took her between his palms,
Turning her to dust
And sweeping her under the rug.
Something,
And then nothing.
She was always drawn to light.
That's how she found the boy because
To her he seemed warm,
To her he seemed trustworthy,
To her he seemed like a friend.
There was no white van,
No stranger danger.
He didn't lure her in with lies of a lost dog,
Like her parents promised would happen
If she dared leave the front porch step.
Her parents,
They always thought that she'd become a butterfly,
But she was always too colorless,
Too careless,
Too trusting in a light that she never knew was artificial
Until she saw it leave his eyes,
Black
And staring down at her,
Ready to turn her to nothing.
She was too weak to fly away.
He made sure she knew that,
Just like he made sure she was properly wiped away,
No gray mark and no reminder,
No evidence of what had happened because her silence was ensured.
Is still ensured.
But I can see it in her,
Her desire to step out from the rug,
Into the light,
To spread her wings like the butterfly,
The woman,
Her parents would have wanted her to be.
She is not a statistic and
She will not let herself be another tally mark on a page
Or the dust on his palms,
She will not let herself become nothing.
Sometimes,
Things are drawn to light because the same thing is burning deep inside of them,
Nothing,
And then something again.