My colleague Erica knows I like to raise butterflies. After recess, she came into my classroom exclaiming “You Have to see this moth on the playground!”
My students and I rushed out to find it. At first it was poised on the brick post of the pavilion. Then one of them stimulated it with a stick and it flew to me. Fascinating large creature that is camouflaged as a leaf. Who knew?
With my students, we researched and found out that it was a Pandorus Sphinx Moth. I wrote a found poem from the information on the website Insect Identification. In this poem, each word in the poem comes from the article in the order it was found.
Playground Discovery
Hawk moth
boasts– robust
fast fliers on
aerodynamic wings.The Pandorus Sphinx Moth
blending in
inside woodlands
at dusk or dawn.
Reflections on the Teche 
Wow, Margaret! This is some moth! I love seeing these critters and learning about them. I like robust fast flyers.
A wild array of
imagination,
ostentation, and
sheer frippery is
needed to describe
the 160,000 species of moth,
but this one,
attached to my pocket
is foliage fabulous.
Karen Eastlund, Draft
Love the word “frippery” and “foliage fabulous.”
Sheer frippery! That’s great!
Yes! Foliage Fabulous! I also love imagination and ostentation together.
Thank you for this, Margaret! I never heard of a hawk moth before. I’ve been playing around with cinquains this week:
Hawk moth,
what brings you here
looking like a green leaf,
still as a stone upon the wall –
hiding?
Thanks for the reminder of cinquains. I should try them next week with my kiddos. I love “still as a stone”.
What an interesting find! A great example in your writing of finding poetry even in nonfiction. So amazing it landed on you!
Reflection on A Moth
God’s creatures
Made with
Infinite variety
Man’s curiosity
Stirred to
Endless wonder
From God’s creatures to wonder, your poem captures the feeling my students and I felt at the sighting.
A lovely reflection!
I like the invitation to wonder… “still as a stone” is a perfect setup for the question- hiding?
What a great catch of a pic! ‘Dusk or dawn’ is a great line to exit on.