A Letter To A Moth

Dear Moth,

I don’t sit outside very often in the night time. Though I suppose I don’t stand or lie down there, either. When night falls, I surround myself with thick walls of plaster and soft glowing lights, and I shiver in the cold that bellows from the vents. It is here that I am safe, it is here that I am surrounded by those that I love, and yet, it is also here that I am blind and deaf to a world that goes on without me. Your world.

You might have been wondering why I was in your company tonight, and if you weren’t, or aren’t currently, it is because you are a moth. Tonight, I found myself too cold to withstand the chill. Too tired to entertain all of the smiling faces within. So, I slipped out the beaten front door and stepped silently onto the cemented pebble path that stretched all the way from the warm illumination of the house to the void-like blackness of the street. The familiar blanket of warm desert air engulfed me at once and I sat amongst the tangle of shadow and light from the little lamps that lined the edges of the walk way. Looking around, I realized that in all my years of coming to my grandparents’ home, I had never sat outside the front door in the darkness. I was always too little and too afraid of what lies beyond the lights. I stretched back and looked up at the black sky dotted with brightly blinking stars. I breathed in deep. It smelled like desert rain and peppercorn. I wonder if you took notice of this, too.

As I lay there, my mind was buzzing and whirling and twirling; quite contrary to the stillness of where I lay. When I tried to quiet it, it only seemed to grow louder. I just couldn’t settle into the world I had entered, and now, it felt, intruded upon. If you’re asking yourself how I could possibly be so consumed by my own thoughts, Moth, I ask myself the same thing. Somewhere in the middle of my inner monologue of self-pity and frustration that explored all of the reasons I may not be able to let go of my mind, I sat up and pulled my knees to my chest, looking out into the blackness. I stayed there like that for some time waiting for quiet until, suddenly, thump: A creature less than half the size of my finger flew directly into my closed lips and crash landed at my feet. I blinked in surprise and looked down to investigate what had just so forcibly kissed me. Of course, it was none other than you, Moth, and whether it was in your dazed confusion that you unknowingly flew into my lips or you had resolved to give me a great big kiss, I’ll never know. I looked at you from over my knees, your white wings fluttering as you walked in clumsy circles. I figured you had gotten too close to one of the lamps and had sent yourself into a brightly lit spiral, as moths are known to do. After a while you stopped stumbling and simply sat there. I couldn’t help but shake my head. So much strife for something so unattainable. I moved a tentative finger down to the ground and placed it in front of you. I wasn’t sure what you’d do, how you’d react, but for some reason it felt like the right thing to do.

A beat. Another. Nothing.

We sat there together in the silence of the night, unmoving. I held my breath as the stormy breeze fluttered around us and it was as if time stood still and all life waited for just one flit of your wings, one twitch of your antenna. Slowly, I watched as your thin, fragile leg reached up and placed itself upon finger as if to shake my hand, and it was with this simple act that so suddenly the mind I had been struggling to quiet finally found its peace. Around me, the world which had been silent and still before seemed to lift its vail, revealing one that I had seldom seen. It was a world of great hustle and bustle, a world filled with humming and buzzing and chirping and clicking. So suddenly the world I had thought slept in these hours of darkness revealed to me that it held more life and vibrancy than the bright waking hours of day. In my moment of discovery, I had hardly noticed you climb aboard my finger. I pulled you close to my chest to let you safely recover from your quest for the “holy grail”.

Together, in the dappled light of the little lamps, we sat in stillness. I watched the night-things go about their business. You found your bearings sitting on my finger. I had hardly even noticed my mind go quiet. But it had.

Thank you, Moth.