Fireflies

In between her incoherent words
her fading memory emits flashes
every now and then.

She sees no hope and no reason
for an existence as bland and repulsive
as the smell of medics that keeps her neurons
busy.

He must have been there, in that plot of sunshine,
his hair well-brushed, his smile as infectious
as the breeze at the onset of spring.

All she can see through her window is the mist, rising.
Her vision blurs, yet in the marshlands fireflies glitter
in dozens, and she clutches on to the softness of her pillow.

A pendulum swings along its arched path,
red florets fall off from the flame tree, and a white-eye,
utterly cautious, hunts for its prey.

Twilight brings in the fireflies by swarms,
and she feels no need for a candle.