This week’s episodes are guest hosted by Shira Erlichman.
Today’s poem teaches us that you can’t choose your holy moments. The poet is a sudden citizen of bewilderment. When it comes time to express a kinship across species, he finds himself bereft.
— Shira
Very Large Moth by Craig Arnold
After D.H.L.
Your first thought when the light snaps on and the black wings
clatter about the kitchen is a bat
the clear part of your mind considers rabies the other part
does not consider knows only to startle
and cower away from the slap of its wings though it is soon
clearly not a bat but a moth and harmless
still you are shy of it it clings to the hood of the stove
not black but brown its orange eyes sparkle
like televisions its leg joints are large enough to count
how could you kill it where would you hide the body
a creature so solid must have room for a soul
and if this is so why not in a creature
half its size or half its size again and so on
down to the ants clearly it must be saved
caught in a shopping bag and rushed to the front door
afraid to crush it feeling the plastic rattle
loosened into the night air it batters the porch light
throwing fitful shadows around the landing
That was a really big moth is all you can say to the doorman
who has watched your whole performance with a smile
the half-compassion and half-horror we feel for the creatures
we want not to hurt and prefer not to touch
"Very Large Moth" by Craig Arnold. Used by permission of the poet's estate.
The Slowdown is a production of American Public Media, in partnership with the Poetry Foundation. This project is also supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.
