Leftover Nightmares
Sharp teeth of moths that daily fray the fabric of my dreaming
through the faulty screens of youth continue to come streaming.
Will nothing seek to stop their flights and free me from my dread
of lines of dusty millers that by rights should now be dead?
I try to curb my memory—the dull sheen of their eyes
as they fly slowly toward me in their moth disguise.
All those evil prairie spirits, rising from the grass
to find me after midnight and fill my dreams enmasse.
This poem is partially memory, partially fiction. The flutter of Miller moths, the adult form of the cutworm, are so much a part of my growing up on the prairies of South Dakota that I named my first book, “Prairie Moths.” Then when I built my own house in Wyoming, moths again rose to swarm around me–so many that I had to light ceiling bulbs at night and put large bowls of sudsy water under the lightbulbs to trap the moths by the hundreds to free my house from them. So, although the surviving nightmares of moths are completely exaggerated, the theme is authentic, brought out by this week’s Wordle prompts. Prompt words today are daily, sheen, rights, try, nothing, sharp, moth, fray, free, line, seeks and streaming.
For The Sunday Whirl Weekly Wordle Prompt 519
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 
YES – I once had problems with moths too~!!
https://mcouvillion.wpcomstaging.com/2020/04/20/a-light-story-not-lite/
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They were really a curse in that new house. The bowl of suds worked wonders. Poor creatures, but it was them or me.
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Sam, this link won’t work for me.
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Thanks for your feed back though that is the only way I know what is going on…. But don’t let it bother you, as usual it is nothing important. Still waiting for a better connection. If not, I have more important things to worry about than WordPress foolishness.
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Having survived two years of the Gypsy Moths and the caterpillars that ate our woods, I REALLY relate! But I’m also afraid of most insects and living out here, I’ve had to learn to cope with creatures that come out of nightmares. I don’t dream about them, though. Or if I do, I don’t remember than. GREAT poem!
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Thanks, Marilyn.
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