Transit of the Moths

At midnight the cranes unlatch their elbows, and hold up bowls of rain above the avenue. Moths rise from the river grass like ash learning, suddenly, that it can sing.

They gather around the work lights, small parchment hearts beating against steel. Each wingstroke writes a brief white vowel on the dark throat of the unfinished tower.

Below, buses kneel and exhale blue heat; a baker drags dawn from an iron drawer. Flour dust drifts through open doors and the moths turn once, as if hearing snow.

By morning only silence clings to cables. The city keeps their vanished grammar, yet every window holds a faint gold tremor, a memory of night choosing to migrate upward.