Last Flashes
I was looking for the light/
To bring you out/
From the shadows/
Redefine you now for only me/
And honey I'm sure/
That you've been in love before/
Plenty of men/
Have held high places in your eyes/
And jealousy/
Has got no use for me/
The past is beautiful/
Like the darkness between the fireflies.
-- Mason Jennings
Two fireflies flash by in the mid-August evening.
Their kind emerge in June in a frenzy of ecstasy, sparkling yellow at twilight for a fleeting matter of weeks, desperate to find a woman who will reciprocate their call and ensure that their short lives will mean something when they end.
She flashes back. The lovers meet. They die. Life goes on.
Not for these two belated suitors of desperation and futility.
What was once a galaxy of pulsing light in the humid dusk is an early-summer relic now.
These two are torch-bearers for a time that passed before it ever seemed to begin, when summer was new and pregnant with the promise that has now fulfilled itself.
They are the bathing suit 75 percent off.
The "Star Wars" movie still playing in the cineplex.
The empty book bags thrown into the closet.
The swimming pool lamp still burning in the deserted pool.
The song that was to be the song of summer before summer decided on a better song.
If only you two could come inside: watch the yellow lights of the school buses flash by instead, then see the leaves turn flaming gold and red, then stay warm by the fireplace, then catch a glimpse of the first petal of the new warm season and then meet your destiny like you should have ...
14 comments:
That was very beautiful writing.. I'll miss summer magic when it goes. :(
End of summers - I will awlays be amazed at how 6 weeks was like 6 years when I was a nipper.
the shot at the end is splendiforous.
a new word I have created especially for it.
wow, they look radioactive. i must read up on these things.
that's probably missing the point, i realise, but i know what you mean... i think.
That was very beautiful... a little depressing, but beautiful... I'm in my mid-twenties, can't find a date, and now I feel very much like a firefly...
first, forgive choppiness but i might have broken my fingrr tonight. typing like preschooler...
dan, thats a pool light in an empty pool. the bugs are hard to photo. i thought it was cool tho that there r lughts of summer that resemble each other. the same desolation.
in britain you have them but theyre called glowworms. they dont fly i think, but they still burn that scientific marvel of cold lite that if we could harness would solve our energy woes.
ash, the diffrence is we get to live far longer. in human years youre still larvae...
sorry tired of typingf
e+
I LOVE fireflies. We do not have them here in the desert. I guess we don't have mosquitoes either, so all is fair.
what have you done to your finger! you are one clumsy assed muddyfunster! broke your ankle twice - bust your arm - and now your finger!
are you a WWF wrestler on the side?
i play fullcourt basketball four times a week. law of averages catches up. saw a pass i could steal middle finger jammed into ball on dudes chest.
going to system of a down in atlanta tomorrw. try not to break sumthing else.
might haveto post just pictures or sumthing for awhile ...
e+
1 more thing. that quote at the beginning is from a mason jennings song, darkness between the fireflies.
just beautiful and hes a great artist. everyone syould check m out. it reminds me of how many males a female firefly will mate with. those boys better leave the past behind b/c jealosy aint evolutionary 4 them
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I will endeavour to seek Mr Mason out
and in return try and find Razorlight
so male fireflies get wasted once they've mated with the dancing queen?
ha, i knew it would be basketball.
yes, i've seen gloworms along time ago at porthmadog in wales.
is that jennings bloke related to waylon jennings?
x-ray negative. little more flexibility now, so i'm with you.
dan,no he's not. he runs with the jack johnson kind of crowd. the best to start with is his 98 debut.
btw, spo i'm checking out jack johnson over labor day. you like him right?
e+
i might try that.
I can't believe you called me larva.. I might have to start charging for babysitting.
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