Ok, quite a while ago, I read this poem that I loved dearly and I had it saved on my old computer. It was my favorite poem, and was actually what got me started reading poetry in the first place. Well, my computer crashed (actually about three of them did), and I lost it--a long time ago. So now I not only need your help finding the poem, I also need your help finding the NAME of the poem.

Here's a quick description, as best as I can figure it:

The general idea was that the writer would rather be a moth that burned in a fire to be a part of that deadly beauty for one moment than to live a long life in the shadows, forever doomed to watch the beauty of the fire, but never be a part of it. His (the writer was a he, I believe) point was that people should never live life on the sidelines and should throw themselves into life--which is one of my mottos.

Anyone have any idea which poem this is? hopes

Rachel

"If my doctor told me I had only six minutes to live, I wouldn't brood. I'd type a little faster."-Issac Asimov

"Forget not that the earth delights to your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair."

This one:

The lesson of the moth
-- Don Marquis

i was talking to a moth
the other evening
he was trying to break into
an electric light bulb
and fry himself on the wires

why do you fellows
pull this stunt i asked him
because it is the conventional
thing for moths or why
if that had been an uncovered
candle instead of an electric
light bulb you would
now be a small unsightly cinder
have you no sense

plenty of it he answered
but at times we get tired
of using it
we get bored with the routine
and crave beauty
and excitement
fire is beautiful
and we know that if we get
too close it will kill us
but what does that matter
it is better to be happy
for a moment
and be burned up with beauty
than to live a long time
and be bored all the while
so we wad all our life up
into one little roll
and then we shoot the roll
that is what life is for
it is better to be a part of beauty
for one instant and then cease to
exist than to exist forever
and never be a part of beauty
our attitude toward life
is come easy go easy
we are like human beings
used to be before they became
too civilized to enjoy themselves

and before i could argue him
out of his philosophy
he went and immolated himself
on a patent cigar lighter
i do not agree with him
myself i would rather have
half the happiness and twice
the longevity

but at the same time i wish
there was something i wanted
as badly as he wanted to fry himself

archy

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Les