Imago

Imago (n): The last stage of development of an insect, after emergence from the pupa.

I watch the moth crack from its cocoon. Stretch its wings in slow, exultant circles, stirring the miasma of the closed cell. I am no longer alone.

What feeble sun seeps through the cracked bars on the window dries the shine from its delicate gray scales. Suddenly I am afraid. He was here when I arrived. Weaving his bed in the derelict corner between the toilet and the stained wall. We were two of a kind. Locked in synchronicity, both of us stagnant. But he has changed. He has evolved.

Now he tilts toward the sun, balanced on the lacuna between the bars, a space thin enough for him to slip through. Not me. Never me.

I will be alone again. Alone to rot here. Alone to ruminate, oscitate, masticate. And now that they’ve stopped coming with the supplies, stopped cleaning the reeking mess bucket in the corner or leaving water inside the door, I will dehydrate. Deteriorate. Suffocate.

I slap my hand, palm down, on those bright, clean wings, as hard as I can.

I will not die alone.

An entry for the second campaigner challenge of Rachael Harrie's Platform-Building Campaign. Prompt: Write a blog post of less than 200 words, using Imago in the title, and the including the words miasma, lacuna, oscitate and synchronicity.

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