I walk outside, the floorboard of the porch creaking quietly under my feet. It fills the silent night air with a speck of noise. Out from under the porch roof, I glance up at the sky. It's pitch black, like a large piece of coal resting on top of the world; above me. Little bright stars dot the sky, sparkling like precious, valuable diamonds in the piece of unimportant coal. And hanging in the middle of the sky is the moon. It's big, and brillant, shining light down on the land. Sighing, I take a step foward. The grass makes an odd sound under my feet. The grass is wet because it's been raining for several days now, on and off.
The world is black and almost silent. Except for the crickets chirping, and making a melodious sound. Even though it doesn't sound the greatest, if you open your heat and ears, you can hear a beautiful piece of music with a symphony of crickets that composed it.
I breathe in the cool fresh air, and it stabs my lungs. And then a light flickers on and off, right in front of my face.
I gasp, and back up. As I look in the air, little pinpricks of light flick on and off, like lightning. I smile, upon realizing what these flickering creatures are.
Fireflies. Laughing, I cup my small, pale hands together and run fowards, stumbling across the ground. Right in front of my face, a firefly lights up, and then the light quickly burns out. Quickly, I reach fowards and cup my hands around the air where the firefly was. Instead of catching one, I catch the empty air. After a moment, I run inside the house and grab an empty jar. I poke a couple of miniscule holes in the lid, and then head back into the dark blanket that is hugging the world outside. Once again outside, I begin running around, and laughing with glee. The fireflies were quick. Except one.
One old firefly doesn't fly very fast. I easily catch it in my jar, and then place the rusty brown lid on top. For the longest time, I watch the firefly in the jar light up and then burn out. It holds me in a trance. But I know I must let this beautiful firefly go. This firefly has a right to fly around, to be with it's friends. To be free. I uncap the jar and the firefly flies slowly out. As it flies off into the distance, I watch it go, lighting up and burning out. A firefly. A speck of light, of hope.
