Love is a Luminous Insect at the Window
—for Lauren Marie Espada
The word love: there it is again. Indestructible as an insect,
fly faster than a swatter, mosquito darting through a net.
How the word love chirps in every song, crickets keeping
a city boy up all night. I wish I could fry and eat them.
How the word love buzzes in sonnet after sonnet. I am
the beekeeper who awakes from a nightmare of beehives.
To quote Durán, The Panamanian brawler who waved a glove
and walked away in the middle of fight: No más. No more.
Then I see you, watching the violinist, his eyes shut, the Russian
composer’s concerto in his head, white horsehair fraying on the bow,
and your face is bright with tears, and there it is again, the word love,
not a fly or a mosquito, not a cricket or a bee, but the Luna moth
we saw one night, luminous green wings knocking at the screen
on the window as if to say I have a week to live, let me in, and I do.
by Martín Espada
from Floaters
W.W. Norton, 2021