On a humid summer night
I sat down and lit a corner lamp,
its kerosene flame exposing

webs dust detritus inside
when outside on the glass

a cranefly, swift and strong,
into luminescence swooped,
a pterodactyl landing who

had landed, wings snared
in a triangle unseen, woven

and kept by a tiny foe waiting
running up and down thin
hawsers running as the giant flapped

and punched to get out, big jumbo-jet
effort useless and tiring withal
as all in all it slowly rolled and rolled

spent itself against relentless force,
a Lilliputian ending its Brobdingnagian flight:

an insecti-fable of cunning over strength,
strategy over brawn, as in a spotlight

drawn I saw how you and I
with demons and brutes outside and in
wrestle and fight and strive

and, like the long July light,
overcome in the dawn of our night.