LIGHT RINGS......................................................................................................................................................BERNADETTE MCBRIDE

Light Rings

Poem by Bernadette McBride

I point 6-year-old Joey’s attention to the lime-green baby caterpillar curling itself along the sidewalk in front of our homes, and before I take a second breath, he lifts his miniature Nike and stamps the poor thing to goo,

spreads it from the bottom of his shoe to the curb, scraping and scraping it away like Lady MacBeth unable to stop washing her hands. But without her guilt. My horror is visceral —it’s all I can do not to glare at him like a school marm

shaking a long finger. Then I recall summer nights long ago—gaggles of kids on the block—allowed to run free till parents called us in for baths. How many fireflies we caught those nights, dropping them into glass jars,

holes poked by the boys with an ice pick into the tin lids. They were the lucky ones. Others we stripped of their tiny lamps, lined them around our fingers—brilliant rings turning us into lords and ladies, queens and kings.