Goldwing Moth
A goldwing moth is between the scissors and the ink bottle
on the desk.
Last night it flew hundreds of circles around a glass bulb
and a flame wire.
The wings are a soft gold; it is the gold of illuminated
initials in manuscripts of the medieval monks.
Carl Sandburg
I puzzle over this.
The scissors and the ink bottle,
that circling a thing of light, an incandescence -
is this showing us the writer at his work?
Is the goldwing moth made holy by its object,
by the light which compels it?
I go back over the poem, which only seems simple.
