“It is certain…that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have.”
— James Baldwin

Blue glass covers
Black moth.
This glass
is translucent,
glazed slick
in fire so hot,
it forgets
its own past

Moth flutters
under the weight
of its own. You
wanted to save it,
heard wings
beat, hush-like,
but worried
its hunger,

worried it was
a hunger meant
for things loved:
wool of warmth,
cotton quilt,
fine things,
mementos. And so
the glass stays.

We tap it, watch
moth reach, stretch
one leg, then another,
segmented (we’ve
broken something
haven’t we?) and
attach itself to
inverted bottom.

It wants this
to be sky, so holds
it up and rests,
understanding
the great weight
above it, knowing
it stays, like Atlas,
between worlds.