A home of Gospel Music. A Poem.

A home of Gospel music.
By Myranda N.
Build me a home tucked away in the folds of a hill,
Cradled in the branches of birch trees.
Wrapped in the warmth of a fire and Blazing cardinals.

Stay by my side through sickness and in health.
Don’t write your vows, carve them in the wood of our veranda.
Sing them like hymnals on Sunday morning, loud and joyous.

At night the floors will creek, and the walls will sigh.
The sweet melody of our love will bubble up,  can you see it?
A white picket fence encircles our little piece of heaven like a string of pearls.

Memoirs of a Downtown kid.

Memoirs of a Downtown kid. 

By Myranda Neizer.
I love nothing more than the cool breeze that touches my sweaty body late at night when the windows are open and the door is left to swing open and closed at its own accord. It’s worth every mosquito bite in the morning.
    The sound of horse hooves can be heard echoing through the darkness, bouncing off of the pools of light that fill up the street like puddles of rain. The horses pull buggies filled with pointing fingers and smiling faces.
Point, point, point, the tourist with grins plastered on their faces point out everything around me. The cobble stone streets and shaded porches, the stucco walls. They point and stare at things I’ve always known, things that I’ve always loved. Sometimes they even point at me. “Mommy, where is that girls shoes?”
    “Twang, twang, twang,” Greasy men strum their instruments with their palms out and hats poised to catch any loose change tossed their way.
    Teenagers who appear as old as dirt, smell of musk and sweat, lurk in the allies. These are my people. Dread locked hippies clad in rags, dizzy in their cloud of smoke and breathe. You see them flying their signs and you wonder how high they’ll go. How far have they come? Have they ever slept on the rail road, backs flush against cold planks and sharp gravel? Their eyes cast up wards searching for a star that they can swallow like a pill. Their bare feet walk for hours just to inhale misty morning salt from oceans that lay as flat and still as mirrors. The blackened bottoms of their feet are like road maps, as if the asphalt seeped into them, staining their souls. Who ever said eyes are the windows to the soul has never seen a travelers feet. Has never read the journey caked and scraped into their heels. The condition of your feet is the window to your soul.
    I love these people. The ones whose skirts hang down to their ankles, stained brown with muddy scum from the street they sleep on. The people who have cleansed themselves down to the bare bone of things. Who have stripped away the flesh of society and live right next to the pearly white bones that most people are not aware of. I love the people who do not bother with sinking their teeth into the fat offered on the outside. The people who know that all the strength comes from the marrow, that sweet nectar that can only be found after you crack the hard surface and get a few splinters in your gums. Or between your toes.

Cardboard time machine. A poem.

Cardboard time machine.

By Myanda Neizer.

What Do you do with a cardboard box?
Sail away in it of course!
 And when you have gone from coast to coast and have seen every fish in the sea,
 leaving no gulf unexplored,
go to the moon!
Wear Orions belt as a bracelet,
Take a sip from the milky way.
Wrap up each and every speak of a planet in your marble bag to trade for treasures later.
I'll give you a hunk of opal for Pluto,
because back in my day Pluto was still a planet.
What I would give for a cardboard box-time machine,
to go back and relive those days with.
Not just back, but forward as well.
Forward to when we recycle cardboard boxes to make robots.
Like a child’s dream,
Like turning corn into gasoline.
All of that is impossible, right?
Look at this, when I touch this screen, my best friend is looking right back at me!
Instant communication in  the palm of my hand,
As thin as a piece of cardboard.

Cancer. A poem.

    Cancer.

It feels as if a bird is caught between the air I breath and exhale.

Lodged up close to my throat in a loving embrace.

Its wings beat a million miles per second in a frenzied attempt to escape.

Slowly the bird molts, its feathers peeling away into small flakes of confetti,

I want to gather up the pieces and plaster them on the walls of your rib cage.

Like posters advertising a one day only event, so that every beat of your heart is a celebration.

I want to fold myself up and crawl between your ribs, Like a love note slipped into your locker.

Someday I’ll slip through that thick layer around your heart, as quite and slick as cancer.

I’ll devour your affection like my last breath of air, like the breeze coming off of the little birds wings.

~Myranda Neizer.

Fins and Teeth.

                                     Fins and teeth.

By Myranda Neizer.

A flash of red catches my eye in the waves. Off in the distance, catching slants of light from the sun, is what seemed to be a head of hair. Rubbing my stinging eyes, I peer again into the glistening blue. No one would be swimming out so far from the shore, with sharks and God knows what else lurking in the belly of the waves, right? Yet even after wiping my salt caked sleeve across my face and looking again into the surf the floating form still bobs before me. Down below the crew scurries about unaware. “I’m only a drummer boy on a ship,” is all I am thinking as I jump across the railing and hit the water with a splash.
The warm mist eats me up for a second, and then spits me back to the surface. Kicking my bare feet, I make my way to the victim.
Her skin appears deathly pale against the sparkling water as each stroke I take brings me closer to her. She looks dead floating there amongst the frothy sea spray. For a moment I stop swimming as my heart beat slams against my chest, treading water I catch my breath. Behind me I can hear clearly the up roar I caused on deck. The commotion mingles with my frantic breathing, choking me. “Just do it!” I push myself, “If she’s dead than at least you tried.”
I start swimming towards her again, while reaching out to grab her shoulder with shivering fingers. Just as I am about to touch her she opens her eyes. Liquid brown spears see right through me, turning my blood to ice water in my veins. Antarctic glaciers shift in the pits of my stomach, making me gasp in surprise.
Like an idiot I gaze back at her, drinking her features in as the tides gurgled beneath us. What is she?
Suddenly she lurches toward me, this woman who is part fish, part goddess, and grabs my shoulders in an iron grip. Her strength surprises me as she attempts to press me under the surface. Still so shocked is I by this thing that I do not try to get away her at first. It takes me a few seconds to realize she is going to drown me. I try to kick away in demoralized fear with little effect. My life flashes before me in whirl. Tightening her hold on me, I quickly come to terms with the fact that she is capable of snapping me in two like a pencil. On the verge of dyeing a watery death, all I can seem to think about is what this thing is. A wave washes over my face, picking us up in its embrace and making me choke. While I clear my mouth of sea water I ask, “What’s your name?”
The sound of my voice surprises me as much as it does her. Her hands press me down further into the water and I know she is about to punish me for my out burst. Instead she leans closer and whispers in my ear, “Aurora.”
Her eyes soften as she looks at me. “What is yours?” she asks.
I think it is a bit odd my murderess is making small talk with me in the middle of the ocean but I am not about to tempt her. “Samuel,” I say loud enough for her to hear over the roaring of the crashing waves around us.
“I shall spare you Samuel,” she lets me know matter-of-factually.
“But if you do not bring me a man to take your place by sunset tomorrow, I will sink you and your ship.”
The thought makes me want to retch, but Instead I inquire, “What are you?”
“Do you not listen to the gossip around you Samuel? You must have heard of mermaids before?”
Her tone suddenly changes as she tells me, “Enough talk now Samuel, I will take you back to the ship and when you climb aboard point me out to the captain, I’ll do the rest.”
Her voice is like underwater sea weed stroking my ears. I feel a warm haze drift over me; I will not snub her wants.
My legs hurt as I climb the rope ladder up to the ships deck. Breathing heavily, I try to explain what happened, well what happened up to a point. My voice comes out strained as I point frantically over board. Of course no one believes me but the captain, a fair man, takes a look. What he sees is a woman smiling back at him. Her coral pink lips part in a seductive grin. With her index finger she beckons him into the sea. Not waiting a moment the captain abandons ship, over the railing and into the open jaws waiting below. I watches with horror as Aurora opens her mouth like a snake, showing off rows and rows of shark-like teeth. After eating our captain she dives under the surf, the tip of her tail splashing goodbye before leaving with the rest of her.
The crew is scared witless at what they have just witnessed. Outrage and fear takes hold over them, whipping them about like a loose sail fluttering in the wind. All seems hopeless as the sailors crumble under the pressure. That is until someone steppes forward to take control. A young man about Samuel's age takes charge with out waiting. His strong, strict tone snappes the other men back into attention. Their vessel after all, could not sail itself.
If only wish I had the guts to sail it myself, I think to myself. I knew all too well though that no one would respect me, since I am only a drummer boy for them to listen to.
Once in dry cloths again I sit and watch the sea. Deep down I want to see Aurora even after seeing what she had done. Long locks of my hair fell across my faces the setting sun slipped from view.
Yes, I am sure I will have done what she has asked, even if I is not threatened. In a way I is in love with Aurora, this man eating creator I’d never see her again. At least I think I will never see her again. I is wrong about that, she came to find that night.
A whispering sigh reached my ears around midnight, waking me from my dreams. At first I think it is only the sound of water brushing past the ships walls. I rolled to my side and is about to fall back asleep when I heard it again. Soft as mist after rain, her voice roused me. “Go up to the deck,” she whispered.
Fully awake now I do just that. Quietly I made my way to the deck and looked over the rail facing north. Aurora waited below, smirking in the moonlight. Her red hair is blazing even with the lack of light. “Hello,” I greeted her.
I do not even try to keep the pleasure from my voice as I welcomed her. This seemed to please her. “Hello Samuel,” she said.
“I came to offer you another deal,” she whispered.
“What kind of deal?” I asked, once again not hiding my emotions, I is confused.
Bating her eyelashes she whispered up to me, “I can make you the captain of this ship, if you want.”
This charmed me, grabbing my attention almost as strongly as she grabbed me earlier that day. “How will you do that?” I wondered out loud.
“All you have to do is point me out to the new captain,” she explain calmly, “this time however, do it differently.”
“I don’t understand,” I whines, “How do you want me to do it if not how I did today?”
With a flash of her white teeth she snickers, “By tricking him with his own pride.”
“Continue,” I ask her. There is no doubt I will fulfill her every whim.
Not only do I want to please her, but I do not mind being captain either. From drummer boy to captain, I think comically.
“Tell him he is a coward,” Aurora suggestes, “call him out in front of his crew and insist he is no man at all unless he can look the mermaid in the eye and live to tell the tail. He will try to prove you wrong and fail.” She finished.
“How will the death of that captain make me his stand-in?” I ask with doubt, “I am only a drummer boy.”
“Simple,” she giggles, “The captain will fail and when he does you will tell the men that you can do what he could not.”
Shrugging her slim shoulders she adds, “The look down at me to prove you can and I will let you see me with out calling you into the sea.”
“They’ll respect me for what I can do,” I laugh happily.
Gazing down at her I find myself again wrapped up in a hazy fog. Yawning, I stretch, but the haze does not lift.
“Go to bed Samuel, you have quite a task in the morning,” Aurora said.
Nodding my head in content agreement I once again head towards my bed. When I wake I shall put Auroras plan into action and make myself captain.

As dawn arches her back, rising from her slumber behind the horizon, I awoke in anticipation of the turn of events. Clearing my voice once, I tilt my head back, letting a bellowing scream erupt into the mornings glory. The tinted red attire of dawn falls upon the forms of the sailors as they come sprinting to my aid up on deck. Heads of sleep tussled hair and eyes heavy with sand stand before me with questions. “What is it now drummer boy?” one sailor demands.
“The beast has come again,” I explain to the men, “she has come to lay claim on another soul that calls this ship home!!”
This strikes a nerve among them, jarring them awake. I have their undivided attention now as the rest of Auroras plan unfolds from my lips.
“Who will slay her before she takes another like she took our captain?” I ask without really expecting volunteers.
While sparkling garments flow down to warm the sea and man alike, I position the trap Aurora so cleverly designed.
“I’ll bet my life and all of yours that no man but I can calm and send away this thing that breaths salt and moisture.”
There, I think, the trap as been set. Clever eyes regard me with doubt as this statement I have just made sinks in. shining wool from dawns robe clings to our skin, causing prickles of sweat to bead up. “So the drummer boy thinks he’s a hero?” the new captain roars.
Laughter rings across the sun kissed surf, the alarm vanishes like fog. I am left feeling like a fool, even more pathetic and deflated than before.

Just when all is about to go back to normal Aurora leaps on board, snatching the captain that has just spoken up in her webbed claws.
Shrieks poor forth like blood from a wound, bodies struggle to escape the scene that’s taking place in front of them all. With a fierce hunger Aurora devours the boy who thinks himself a man a few moments ago. The sound of flesh shredding makes my stomach turn. I stand frozen and awe struck watching, wondering how it might all end up when suddenly I remember my role! I am supposed to stand against her and become the hero for the whole ship. Moments before she slips back into the sea, blood dripping from her jowls, I grab her by the tail, attempting to seem brave.
“Take me beast!” I bellow in mock courageousness.
Hissing at my touch, she backs away until she bumps against the railing. With arms raised she does a good job at pretending to fear me. I feel like I am the gallant slayer instead of a drummer boy playing the part. Taking a step forward I curse at her, demanding she leaves and never returns.
Yowling, she retreats into the sea, yells from the men following in her wake.
I turn with a smug grin to greet not thankful applause but anger and fear. “The boy is a witch!” one man accused.
“He works black magic, controlling the sea and her creatures!” another added.
Hands yank me, pulling me to the floor as rope binds my wrist behind my back. “No, I am a hero!” I insist.
My pleas fall on deaf ears, only the sound of their own reasoning could be heard. “We must send the witch into the sea with his fish woman!” they chant.
Where were the panic stricken men now? Gone and replaced with these reproachful brutes. Together the sailors condemn me to the sea floor, not one will be willing to lend a hand to save me.
do I deserve to be defended? I who tricked and helped kill not one, but two men.
These thoughts confuse me as I sink, the air rushing from my lungs. One other thing occupies my thoughts in my last minutes of consciousness, that thing is Aurora. Her plan failed, where is she now? Sharks circle me around and around, waiting. I scan the crowd of them, looking death in the eye in hopes of seeing her, my love. My vision becomes tunneled as I search in vain for her face, but she is no where to be seen.

A fist full of violets.

A Fist full of violets.

  I closed my eyes and laid my head on her grave stone. Aunt Debra passed away years ago but I’ve come to visit her only once before. Rain splashed down from the clouds that clogged the sky above. The water felt good against my skin as it trickled down the sides of my face. As I laid there against her grave, mud soaking through my jeans, I let my self wonder back to the years I spent knee high. I let Debra and the sunny summers under her porch slink back into view after they had spent murky years hiding away.
When I was six years old my mother became ill in a way that medicine can’t quite cure, just dull. Depression gripped her and kept her captive, nothing could loosen its grip as she lay dormant behind her “black curtain”. My mothers’ friends who took care of me referred to her hours in bed as that, a black curtain that swept over her but would soon swing back out of place. They always had hope that the black curtain was not permanent, but a passing bout. “Don’t worry Lee, darling, your mother will be ready to play with you tomorrow,” they would reassure me, but that assured tomorrow never came.
It was like only I saw her as she was, a flower deprived of water, destined to wilt. So it came as little shock to me when I was shipped off to my Aunt Debra’s house way down in south Florida.
The morning I was assigned my fate is still pungent in my mind.
I recollect padding across the tile floor to her bedside were she peered up at me with eyes glazed. Out of folds of sheets and bedspreads a soft whisper rose to greet me, “Lee, honey, you’re going to go live with your aunt Debra for awhile.”
Tears dampened my eyes, bursting out across my cheeks. I laid my head on the edge of her bed and sobbed, “Why do you want me to go?? Can’t I stay with you, mama?”
“No tears now Lee, you have to be a big girl,” she instructed,” now give me a kiss then go pack up your bags.”
Standing on my tiptoes I planted a kiss on her sunken cheek. The smell of her perfume tickled my nose making me sniffle more. “I love you mama,” I whispered into her soft skin.
Tears fell from my chin, landing on her blue-black hair that was identical to my own. Turning to leave obediently I looked over my shoulder at my mother; it felt so wrong turning my back on her and leaving the room. My eyes shifted from her fragile form to the objects that took up residents in the room around her. The curtains billowed beside her bed, waving goodbye to me as I closed the door. The door shut making a click as it fell into place, the sound was like a gun shot in my ears. It rang there in my ear drums as I made my way down the hall to my room to pack my things. At the time my only wish was to make my mother well again. To banish the black curtain to some small closet far, far away from me and my family. Now, 17 years later, I wish I could make the dead walk again. Sadly I am not God.
But that’s only a small portion of my story, the core of the apple, so to speak. My woes were only beginning at the ripe age of seven and a half. They paused for a few years while I was with Debra. She eased my pain with loving devotion. She and I would pick violets from her yards, her dwarf hound, Doc, always by our side. Debra’s remedy to all pains was Blue-Stella incense and a cup of cold tomato juice. Nights more often then not were spent in her big, four poster bed. We would go through the ritual of putting me in my own bed, tucking me in and opening the door just enough. Then, every night I’d climb out of my own bed and go to her. Poking her with my index finger I would whisper real low as to not wake up Doc, “Aunt Debra? Aunt Debra, scoot over.”
With a grunt she would roll to her side, leaving me a space to cuddle into. In the morning I would wake to find myself sprawled across her bed, Aunt Debra in the kitchen cooking. Sunday mornings were the best because she made her corn fritters. Scampering in to her sun lite kitchen, she would welcome me in a loud drawl, “good morning my rubber duck!”
“Quack!” I’d happily respond just to see her grin down at me.
“Go wash the duck food from your eyes and I’ll have your breakfast on the table when you get back,” she’d instruct.
Chanting “Quack, quack, quack!” off I’d march to the bath room.
I was a happy child then, without a mother or father but happy none the less.
It was a Sunday in May when I woke to find my aunt Debra still in bed with me. With all my might I tried to wake her but she wouldn’t budge. Doc lay quietly at the end of the bed as I tried to wake her, muffled whimpers coming from him occasionally. He didn’t follow me as I ran from the house, hot tears streaming from my eyes down my face. Florida’s humid, sticky air washed over me as I made a mad dash across the yard and down the road to our nearest neighbor’s house. I threw myself against Ms. Smiths’ screen door, sobbing and banging on it loudly. “Help! Ms. Smith, help!” I yelled at the top of my lungs.
The old widow came sprinting out to me wrapped in a puffy pink robe. After explaining to her what all the screaming was about she called for help. I waited on her floral couch for what seemed like hours. Ms. Smith found me there later and crushed me to her breast as she sobbed on the top of my head. “You poor child,” she snuffed into my hair. I cried into her pink rode not because I knew what was going on but because I was utterly confused. I wanted my Aunt Debra and I wanted out of this woman’s house.
I didn’t know death back then. A constant hand that leered dormant over my life until it came smacking down, whisking away what I loved and cherished most. The people I loved were always being swiped away by one thing or another, death or black curtains, leaving me to travel alone to the next perch I could rest on. You can only be slapped down so many times before you learn your lesson and stop getting back up. My mother died shortly after sending me to live with my aunt. She had known for a while she had cancer and it was growing, bent on having her life. She didn’t want to get better; the black curtain had blinded her of all hopes of getting better and being happy. The billowing curtains waved farewell to her in her bed a few weeks after they fluttered partings to me. As I grew older I learned this, and that my Aunt Debra was also taken by the same cancer. I like to think she didn’t know of the sickness that was developing in her, that she didn’t just choose to leave me without a fight.
Lifting my hand up I rubbed it against my damp peach fuzz, all that’s left of my hair after the chemotherapy. Maybe it’s ironic that I will die of the same sickness my two dearest guardians died from, or maybe it’s just bad luck. Either way I refuse to go down without a brawl. My mother once told me that the world has teeth that sink deep into the toughest person skin, but what tears you apart the most is trying to keep the world out. It does no one any good trying to keep life’s challenges at bay; instead you have to try to do the best with what you have without giving up. Once you give up, you sink.
The sun began to poke through the clouds, sending down warm rays of light. I stood to leave, brushing my pants off the best I could. I knew I wouldn’t be back here to this place again even if the cancer allowed me to stick around for a few more years. “I miss you Aunt Debra,” I whispered to no one in particular.
I hoped my aunt wasn’t around to hear me. Instead I wanted her to be off in some magical place whether it is heaven or not. It just felt nice talking to her again like old times. I liked the way her name rolled off my tongue like it did when I was young and asking for a vase to put my fist full of violets in.

The difference between moths and butterflies.

The difference between moths and butterflies.
(yes, another short story. Sorry it has been so long.)
By Myranda Neizer.

Have you ever come across a Luna moth in the early hours of the morning, when it’s fluttering amidst the dewy grass on broken wings? That’s when death is so close you can feel it crawling across your toes while it journeys to the unfortunate soul that will no longer be breathing in a matter of hours, or even minutes. Sometimes I wonder what it accomplished before that moment, what it did to lead up to its dreary dance with eternal sleep. I always thought things were supposed to pass in to another life in the comfort of the dark, away from the prying eyes of the sun and the chorus of singing birds. Like an old dog that slinks under a porch before sighing its last lung full of air.
Or maybe the Luna moth finds company in the awaking world, feels a certain pleasure in being surrounded by things that have a day to live through while it’s are done and gone. Whatever the reason, I personally feel a sense of loss when I come to find such a scene as this. I can’t watch long as the dying creature withers. Throughout the day it haunts me, whispering in my ear like a mosquito you can’t quite swat away. It buzzes about, causing a story to form upon my lips like a cold sore, blistering forth for everyone to see.
This story is about the kind of love that forms in your bones where you can’t scrub it off. It is about a girl who stopped being a social butterfly and started living and about a boy who is simply referred to as a Luna moth because that is simply what he was.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
The girl I am talking about was young in age but old at heart. She was what most would consider normal, she laughed and smiled like everyone else and cried when tears where meant to be shed. However, inside she was empty and hollow, and in this hollow space a monster resided. It filled her up, shoving her bones and flesh aside to make room for its hunger and sheer mass. It made her tired, so tired that all she wanted to do was close her eyes and sleep the days away.
So day in and day out she would place on her face a mask of a girl everyone wanted to see, and on her back she created fake social butterfly wings. She’d use them to scurry through the day, skimming across the fragile fabric of her “friends” and keeping herself aloft with her wings. No one really knew that while she was laughing she was crying, and while she was smiling she was screaming, or that her happiness was a lie that festered inside of her. The lies just sat there and grew until it was ready to pop and spill poison throughout her veins.
Just when she was sure the monster was going to kill her off and release itself into her life, something shifted. A break in the fog allowed her to peer through. What she saw was a green moth hovering in a dark corner. A nook tucked out of sight that was made less bleak by the warmth emanating from him, a single Luna moth. She saw him and reached for him with all of her might, tugging herself through the layers of muddy fog that clung to her like a cocoon. The light beckoned her forward, out of the grasp of the monster and the lies. When at last she broke loose from the cocoon it was like she was finally free. And with her new found freedom her only wish was to re wrap herself in his loving embrace.
With gentle fingers the moth tugged off her mask and wrapped her in his silky wings. She welcomed him into the hollow of her mind where he replaced the monster that use to gorge itself there. Together they feed and thrived from one another, safe and warm. For months they were like this, happy and content while basking in the eternal glow of his wings.
It wasn’t until later that the girl noticed the moth preferred the dark corner of his world because he was left alone in it. His solitude was something he treasured, and when he’d pull away she was left to flounder in the dark until he returned. Learning to live without her lies wasn’t so hard with the moth around, but when he took the time alone he so desperately required what was she to do? Loneliness became her companion, cradling her in the night until her soft green lantern returned to her. She understood his need for freedom, that clinging to him too much was like rubbing off the magic powder that allowed him to fly. Though how could she not cling to the only light in her life? How could she not be attached to the thing that she loved so much it made her ache clear down to the bone? When he left her he left behind more than a gaping hole, it was like he was ripping the hole afresh each time. And each time she would bleed out until he returned to fill her up again.
Than the day came that she learned to sew up her own wounds. She taught herself to pick up the needle and thread and lace it through her flesh, creating neat and even stitches around the crater inside her. She may have needed the moth to feel full, but not to live her life. All she needed was her own two hands all along to patch up the hole and keep moving.
That’s when the hurdle of where to move to came up. The shaded world around her was not one she knew, but one she let the moth guide her through. It had sharp edges she could bump into and unknown things that lurked about.
Longing for the warmth of light she attempted to carry the moth with her into the day but he would not be carried. She cried and begged, pleaded with him but his mind would not be swayed. She tried to go by herself, tried to enjoy the grass beneath her feet and the hot asphalt pinching her bare toes as she darted across the streets to reach the lapping pools of water. Ultimately though he was all she wanted, she needed to be filled with his presence. Where ever she went she thought only of him. The grueling thing was that in returning to him she likewise returned to the thing she was starting to resent, being alone. Tied to him like a kite entangled in a tree branch, she heaved towards the clouds only to be torn up. Why couldn’t she just soar with him in tow? She hated being forced to choose between night and day. The choice between the nectar of flowers in bloom and the connection she felt with him that was so deep it made her pulse quicken in her wrist and throat was becoming harder to make.
Finally it got so bad that she envisioned ripping away from him, sewing up the hole in her body once and for all. It was apparent she couldn’t have both, that she would have to stay or go. The thought of him not returning made the very fiber of her being shiver; she loved him like no other. That thought decided it for her, the pain of just thinking about him not returning hurt like a dagger. They were one thing made of two completely different halves. Constantly they were pulled apart and welded back together by the heat of their love alone.

Again and again she tried to coax him out with her. Tried explaining why she needed him to comply. Tried but failed each time. When she cried he would look away. When she sank into depression he didn’t seem to see or care. Week after week seeped by like sand through open fingers, yet nothing changed. While he wallowed in his darkness, she wilted.

The moth in the hollow of her mind, the lantern of her world, was literally sucking the life from her. But she just couldn’t push him away. She refused to face the thought of not having him a part of her because that thought in itself was enough to bring her to her knees. Inches from his face she would beg him with teary eyes to spare her heart or just go away if he couldn’t.
He stayed, claiming undying love for the very person he was killing from the inside out. It had to stop soon, this much she knew.
He would plead for her to trust him, “Just be patient with me,” he asked, with his hands cradling her broken heart.
Of course she would agree, every time she would agree. Scooping up the last bit of trust she had in her, she placed it in his care without a doubt in her mind she would see the results she needed.
She coddled him, laying him against her breast and allowing his wings to envelope her while she slept. Dreaming of the things they’ll do and what they’ll see, she permitted herself to fall asleep in bliss with their heads touching. They slept on and on in their own little world, stepping on each others toes as they tried to fly together.

With their moist, dewy wings entangled they fluttered about in the glass jar they created for one another. The vision they so desperately tried to produce made them blind and deaf to everything, including themselves. Over and over again their bodies thumped against the glass keeping them from being truly happy and yet they could not see that if they just simply flew up and away they would be free. Drained and sore they wilted against each other, tainting the air they shared with bitter resentment and scorn. Cocooned in the others wings the moth and butterfly slumbered on, occasionally stirring to test the glass walls around them but never looking up. They could not see past one another.

And then the day came that the moth lovingly took her into his arms again and with nimble fingers untied the mask around her face. It dropped away slowly, peeling away the layers off sleep as it fell. The bright light of reality dumb founded her, making her shy away. How had another mask found its way across her face? When she finally opened her eyes and looked the moth was gone. She was alone with damp tears smearing her face, huddled up close to her bleeding heart. For six months she wallowed in her tears, until the light of a new day dried her wings and she flew up and away.
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In its adult form the Luna moth only lives about a week. During this week it does not eat or sleep, its soul goal is to find a mate and reproduce. It’s most commonly seen at night, with a wingspan of 3 to 3.5 inches it’s one of the larger species of moths.