A pulse, a flicker—
like a trembling heartbeat caught in a jar
where dusk is a brittle glass and hope,
a fragile flame refusing to be tamed.
The last firefly—
a flickering cipher of summer’s breath,
a whisper folded into the night’s dark linen,
glowing like a secret too wild for daylight,
too tender for the world’s hard edges.
I remember:
the ache of chasing ghosts with sticky fingers,
grasping at starlight tangled in the high grass,
their lanterns weaving prayers between my palms—
each flicker a stanza in a poem I was too young to read,
too restless to hear.
Those nights were a constellation of vanished moments,
where the air tasted like honey and thunder,
and every caught light was a promise —
that some wild things are meant to live
only long enough to burn us awake.
Now, the silence holds their memory—
a slow dance of shadows behind closed eyelids,
where the last firefly hums in the hollow
of my ribs,
an ember carried from a place
where light is never lost,
only transformed—
into the pulse that guides me home.
Author’s Note:
This poem is a nostalgic meditation on fleeting moments of magic and innocence from childhood, especially summer nights chasing fireflies. It explores how those small, bright experiences continue to live inside me as guiding lights through darker times. Writing it was a way to honor the beauty in what we hold onto, even when it’s gone.
Ollie Coleman | 15 | Hebron, KY | @writenbyollie on TikTok & @ollie.always.here on Instagram
