The Last Fly of Summer
The Last Fly of Summer (a short poem)
The last fly of summer –
I almost killed her!
Then realized how lonely I will feel
when every living thing
is fled or dead or buried down in front of winter.
I let her be.
Eight days she’s kept me company.
“Not on cups!” I say,
so she sits here on my knee,
small and light and quiet,
but alive like me.
A living, moving creature-friend
with me
in the growing lonely inwardness
of winter.