THEY tell me my man is dead— And my babe, the boy that was his father's image; That I shall never walk again. It was the railway; The smoking, mannerless brutal thing They have brought from the Western world— But why this thing happened to me and mine I do not know— I only know that it was night When they told me; they held a candle near my face. About the candle a moth fluttered— Once it brushed my cheek— The moth had brown spots on its wings; Three spots on each wing. It is the wings of this moth That I see ever before me When I try to recall the faces of my man and child. The wings with their brown spots and their fine hairs; Each hair grown large before my eyes, as though It were through a microscope I saw it. And when I would recall the touch Of my man's hand, or the feel of my babe's tender flesh, It is the brush of the moth's wing against my cheek I feel. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...COOPER SQUARE by KAREN SWENSON A WINTER BLUEJAY by SARA TEASDALE THE VIRTUOSO; IN IMITATION OF SPENCER'S STYLE AND STANZA by MARK AKENSIDE |