dear eva and anna

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dear eva and anna,

a woman recalls the incident of the dusty moth wings that swole her eye shut like it’s the tavern shootout scene from her favorite western. so many papery flaps flying through the air, except the only casualty was a temporary cornea interference and a few lop-sided days.

sometimes, i like to imagine the soldiers wearing cowboy hats — their pistols shiny, and their drawls strong. maybe the idea of sure-fire sun is what i like or the performance of a saloon door opening, necks craning toward the source of the sound.

this go around, we’ve had it easy — never knowing death too close outside of the natural kind. this is more than luck in this world. so many growing to know death like a shortcut through their town.

so the russian empire was not a movie set in west texas. so you don’t grow old and fade at the gate of a garden. in the rerun, i carry like a limp, i watch all the alternate endings. still, i am warming a clean washcloth to soothe an unfixable ache.

there is something called a desire line — a well-worn ribbon of earth, a shortcut taken so many times, by so many feet, it forms a path.

it is unclear if we can include in this definition a trail pressed from people running.
not for pleasure          but away

isn’t that one of the great desires that binds us?

a lesser known definition of the word flee is to move swiftly, to take flight.

i guess what i am saying is how can we know for sure a moth is flying toward a light and not away from some darkness we ourselves do not know.

          always,
          n