the evening gnat is the smallest insect of the dusk hour. it does not appear before the sky has gone a particular shade of plum, and it retires when the first window is lit. it appears only in the gap between.
a swarm rises, in late summer, from the lower garden and pauses against a sunset that is itself paused. the swarm has the shape of a held breath. it disperses the moment a window is lit from inside, and reforms only after the lit room has been forgotten by its occupant.
related, distantly, to the solstice moth and the quiet firefly; not at all related to the lullaby dragonfly, though they sometimes share the same patch of air.
— stood by the lower hedge and the swarm thinned each time i tried to count. — e.s.