Moth!

She started wearing the corpse paint when

She’d just turned seventeen,

Renamed herself Pandora, though

Her real name was Jean,

We thought it was just a cult thing when

She dyed her hair pitch black,

Painted her lips and fingertips,

She looked like a shark attack.

 

With piercings in her eyebrows, tongue

And thumb rings on each hand,

An ankle chain that proclaimed her game,

‘I’m anyone’s, on demand!’

She’d go to the Metal concerts or

She’d sit and sulk in her room,

And file her eye-teeth down to a point,

And scare herself in the gloom.

 

She kept a tin trunk under her bed

That she’d picked up second-hand,

But wouldn’t let on just what it held,

She said it was contraband,

We thought that she might grow out of it,

Get sick of being a Goth,

But that was before she came on it,

A huge, Death’s Head Hawkmoth.

 

She’d always collected butterflies

A Lepidoptera freak,

They hung in frames with her Gothic games

And she pinned them every week.

She’d bring them fluttering in a jar

And she’d spread their tiny wings,

Lay them down on a plaster board

And stick them there, with pins.

 

She brought the Hawkmoth home one day

And she let it out in her room,

She said she wouldn’t be pinning it,

It danced to an evil tune.

‘It foretells war, and famine, death!’

She said as she watched it fly,

She seemed entranced as she watched it dance

For her mouth was open wide.

 

I didn’t see, but I heard her choke

And I found her on the floor,

Trying to retch the hawkmoth up

As she choked and spat, and swore,

‘It flew right into my open mouth

And it’s gone right down my throat!

I feel it fluttering way down there,

Will it kill me, if I choke?’

 

‘It’s probably dead by now,’ I said,

‘It couldn’t survive your bile,

It’s just like eating a turkey roast

You’ll digest it, in a while.’

‘I don’t feel well,’ said the Goth from hell,

But she took a sip of Coke,

Then hid away for the rest of the day

Wrapped up in her Gothic cloak.

 

She’d never been very talkative

But she now clammed up for good,

She’d sit in the gloom of her darkened room,

We thought it was just a mood.

But then I opened her bedroom door

To check on our evil Goth,

And out there flew, more than a few

Of the Death’s Head strain, Hawkmoth.

 

Pandora lay way back on the bed

And her mouth was open wide,

All I could hear was fluttering, fluttering

Coming from way inside,

And moths were flying out of her mouth

In a steady stream to the room,

And all the walls and ceiling, covering,

Moths in the afternoon.

 

A week had passed from the funeral,

The coffin was sealed with glue,

For moths kept fluttering out of her mouth

With nothing that we could do.

I finally opened her old tin chest

And found it was full of moths,

Of every species, fluttering, fluttering

Out of Pandora’s Box.

 

David Lewis Paget

Reviews

[emmajoy]

'‘It foretells war, and famine, death!’ ~ She said as she watched it fly, ~ She seemed entranced as she watched it dance ~ For her mouth was open wide.'

Your skills show so strongly in a poem of perhaps fifty percent dialogue, yet the story is amazingly detailed through time. You weave myth with modernity, you display a real character then .. slowly create another view of Pandora in your own special way. This poem is extraordinary throughout but especially in the penultimate stanza.. for me, anyway.

[TL Boehm]

sheesh. this is creepy on a whole new level. I don't know why moths are so scary but they are. Love the description of Jean/Pandora....wonderfully told

[Lena M. P.]

That was freaking! I came as close as I've ever come of tossing my cookies over one of your poems. You are an evil man you are. No truly you are! Seriously as very spooky write and you no I love being scared. Another good one.

[Angel]

I love, love, LOVE this.
I have known kids like this...
They scare me.

[Mary]

whew! creeeeeeepy! I love this! So well done- it would be great to listen around a campfire! David, you are a true master!

[Baby Ricochet]

Ah Goth chicks. They all look like extras from an old Bela Lugosi film. Cool imagery with the moths flying out of little miss chipper's mouth

[Linda Marie Van Tassell]

ABSOLUTELY BRILLIANT! --- Two words that express my admiration for your extraordinary talent. I am honestly blown away by this one. How you circled around at the end and gave Pandora a new life. Amazing!

[Marie]

I like the connection with Pandora here, that I didn't see till the end. I've always thought Goths were just a freakist cult...maybe they're something more...