the ultimate fullness of nothing & our mother's
fear of us becoming moths

i walked down main street 
yesterday-- 
felt the wind absolve
my body of bones & i became
a paper airplane & a pinwheel
out the window of my father's
blue jeep--
i know little about religion 
but i worship the god
of jasmine flower necks &
fake gardenias on grave stones--
& when i resolved to become nothing
i found my way to the back porch 
of my parents house
in the body of a caterpillar--
tossed my skeleton
to a wind chime to use for
a song--
crumpled the notebook paper
lines of my rib cage--
everyone is praying i'm not
a moth & i can feel it when
they look through me--
i wrap myself in the type
of bed sheet you can only get
by walking up to the clouds
& asking for love--
god is hidden & sometimes he's
in your postcards--
the ones of stonehenge & 
seeing as i have been
forgiven for my body
i can  be there now too
in the mutual tourist
photograph that once attempted
to capture the knuckles
of other humans who
have long ago become
another piece of the air--
i am the disappointment of
a moth-- power-winged & 
hungry for light while 
i stand on main street like
a stone in a stream of
monarchs & swallow-tails--
how did everyone get so vibrant
& i end up so muted--
i was incarnated a body
that is best for listening--
& breaking-- crumpled like
notebook paper
on the lamp post behind our house--
a paper airplane from our
my brother's bed room window--
she had hoped she could use
water color or acrylic--
my mother say from the kitchen table
& painted this moth-child & 
called me butterfly--
called me as tempting
as jewelry in the window of the
the thrift store-- so
hopelessly extravagant & dead--
so i collect mosquito bites 
in the park pavilion-- peel
open a notebook & write about 
a boy again-- not because i want
to but because i'm write his apologies
for him & seeing as i gave up
inhabiting the sidewalk
in a body-- i have no way
of asking for one-- i write
my own apologies & lay on
the picnic benches so drenched in night
my skin is nothing
by night cloud & the high cheek bones 
of the moon--
i don't mean to always fall back
into the images of the 
stars but there is an ultimate fullness
in being nothing & ultimate
lightness--
i get to be nothing but a fragment 
of wind & everything that pulls
leaves from the magnolia tree
out my bedroom window-- i get
to be a handful of periods at the end
of apologies & our reunion
in a postcard photograph--
next time you love a girl
make sure she's not a moth--
we're dull & there's not enough nail polish
for our mothers to paint us
into anything but air--