Fireflies

When fireflies light up the night

with tiny, blinking lights, it’s almost

as if the stars are floating, dancing

on the ground. I wonder what it’s like

to hold a star within my hands. Would it contain

faint traces of all the hopes, all the wishes

longing hearts have ever made, as it twirled

in graceful orbit, far away in outer space?

Or would it merely be a lump of rock, no

different from the rest? Once hot and burning

bright, now fallen to a place where it will never

shine again, like fireflies, trapped within a jar,

lights flicker, then go out.