He invited butterflies when he started
and
turned them into moths when he finished
*using me

He told me that he is burning alive,
not literally, but inside. Said that he
feels palpitations every time he thinks
he might go back;

like his heart is a jarful of moths,

beating against glass.
I told him we are all breakable,
but that he is going to make it through.

He asks me if monks can really
spontaneously combust. I reply, no,
but they light themselves on fire.
It’s a way of protest. He says oh.

He then says, I want to protest

against Adderall, Cymbalta, and
Marijuana: he still can’t focus, still
can’t be happy, and being high is
a minor fix. I don’t know what to say.

We sit silent for a while. I ask him
what depression is like. He laughs
and says, it’s like a really drawn out
stubbed toe, only it’s in your head

and no matter how much you curse
you think the pain will only get worse.
It always does too. I just want to die.

The next day he scorched himself.
Someone called 911 and reported a man
walking out of a pawn shop

with a jar full of something dead

and then poured
gasoline over his head and lit a lighter.
I cried. I wondered if there were wings

still fluttering when he burst into ash.
He could have at least saved what little
flight he had left, what little life, for me.

____________________­____________________

D­o you see a shattered girl,
because I've been trying to tell you people all year,

I'm dying here,

like maybe I was flying around to start with,
but on the inside I'm nothing more then a Moth,

and you expect me to do the things butterfly's can do,

when I can't do more then attempt to mimic there actions,
Following far behind while all the butterfly's migrate,

but I can be miles away from my lover & still smell him from all this way,

because I'm stuck behind butterfly's,
trying to find my way to a better home,

and I will never get to a home where I can be excepted,

every place I get to I am to be greeted with fly swatters,
when butterfly's get loving fingertips to land on as if they were tired,

like they had to run from there death like me,

and everyday I fight for my life,
and the butterfly's live theirs carelessly,

so maybe I can dress in the outer shells of butterfly's that once were,

become the thing all people wanted me to be,
stop smelling my lover from miles the part us,

and let the world control me,

But even when I've given everything I've had,
In, to this ****** idea of a plan of normalcy,

just now you decide to say there may in fact be something wrong with me.

and that when I cut my wing on rose bushes,
so maybe I can feel something better then what you've done to me,

and you try to help me months almost a year after when I am close to death,

by killing me three weeks,
before my life span is up,

**tell me why butterfly's got it so good and moths gotta have it so rough?

Swirl round, float, flutter,
Then find the light.
My own force searching
Knocks me back away.
Filled only with more questions,
I pace and stare.
Again I dive forward
Into the mystery,
And fall back once more befuddled.
"Is this all there is?
Will I ever know
For what i search?"
Still glowing me down,
My question floats above me.
Finally with all I am I strike.
As I understand it consumes me,
And I am no more.
Light bulb!
How am I to say
I am any different?
As I look at the sun
I wonder how it's there,
I'm reminded that
what gives me life
burns through my air.
The color of life is
only shown by light,
Proving to men
minds are meant to bend.
Shift, alter, change, arrange
Swirl round, float, flutter
we are all the same.

capturing all the moths in your butterfly net
or so they say
but there is nothing wrong with being a moth
unafraid of living a life inside-out
unlike the people who jeer at you from the other side of the cage
you are not ready to find out if it’s you that is trapped
maybe we all step into the lava that the kids try to avoid
as they jump onto the couch
are you an adult now?

I feel like I am on a train
Watching life speed past me
I only get a glimpsed of the view
Before it is replace with another

I pass busy cities and quiet country sides
These pretty images guide me
And provide me with distractions
A bona fide offer to occupy my mind

Then the train would go through a tunnel
And I would be surround by darkness
Out the window, I am faced with my reflection
A grim ghost, staring into my soul

Head filled with the meaningless
That when I have nothing to distract myself
I am forced to dwell on my thoughts
All my misery pushed away returns

Attracted like moths to the light of my reflection.
They flitter about, rapidly gnawing my clothes and skin.
Who knew misery had such a voracity.
My reflection only looks on with apathy.

Thankfully, this encounter is only brief.
And the train comes out of the tunnel
The sudden light banishes my reflection
And I can continue to look out at the view

Watch as I speed passed it
Without thought nor worry
For the moths have scurry away
Leaving me in peace, for today

Although this train is on a straight line
It feels like it is going in circles
Darkness seekers must be the conductor of this train
As it won’t be long till I return to the tunnel

i live with Moths in my Head.  
they flutter around on dusty wings,
coating my Brain with dirt until that’s
all i see:
a world covered in grime.
nothing’s clean -
especially me.

i want to shove mothballs
in my Ears,
i want to unleash a colony of bats
in my Skull
until every Moth is reduced
to a bad moment
instead of a bad life.  

alas!  these Hands of mine are human -
they are useless.
they cannot breach my Bones
to extract wild, immovable pests
so untamed they grow into ravenous beasts;
beasts that consume my:
Words, Will, Esteem, Ego -
until i am left bereft
of who i hoped to be.  

but as i lay in stillness
side by side with you,
our bodies mixed up spider webs,
i take note of my Hands
holding you -
and i think perhaps
they are not as useless
as i’d first thought.

Moths float out from behind
an opened, warped door.
I push my face into your clothes,
hung heavy like pearls
in an antique shop.
Stale and familiar,
the scent follows me
like a lost little bee.
It buzzes even after I leave.

Hopscotch down the hallway
to find dead crickets
in the bathtub.
Scuffed wallpaper camouflages
a cobweb. Metallic vines
curve around bursts of petals.
I’m certain you chose this pattern,
but I don't know.

Memories are few.
I fill in the holes with honey
and arrowheads.
Indian feathers and
an old brooch.
Piles of pie.
Did you love to bake pie?

Games of bridge
on that old, scratched table top
with a musty deck of Bicycle cards.
Each deck a photo album
of your face.

Your raisined face.
I remember holding it in my hands.
“This aint a walk for old womans.”
And out the door I go.
Empty handed and independent.

LIGHTBULB.

Lightbulb; the moths flutter
and beat themselves to death against an idea.
A thought, vivid like glass, bright like tungsten-
glows.

I am reaching out to my mind again,
my wings burned and burdened...Wait.
I have lost track of my metaphors again...
But then again, like the moths,

I have lost track of many things-
except for the unknown light in front of me.