Saving the Moment

When will I ever learn
to click save;
to give a poem a name
even if it is not the name
it will go through
life with? Why do I feel
as if it must be just so
before I preserve it,
protect the words
mid way through?

Like a child,
it morphs and grows,
back tracks, falls
asleep mid whine
and I find myself
enjoying the process,
watching it sleep
curled on the page.
'Til it wakes,
screaming for attention.

Yesterday, my child, my poem
changed, grew
and I followed
breathlessly along.
So wrapped up
in how it raised its head
and charged off
swirling around itself,
dancing to maple syrup morning magic
that I could do naught
but let my fingers try to keep up
until I moved my mouse
and the poem crashed.

Different words appeared,
another page
and it wouldn't let me back up,
take those seconds back,
and grab my child
before it raced off
into oblivion.

Gone, as if
it never existed but
for a wisp or two of phrase.
Like an illusive scent of wood smoke
it vanished into the ether.
I could not recapture it,
had to walk away
and mourne.

No point
in trying to find it
for it would have changed in its freedom.
It would never be quite the same.
They never are, you know,
once they fly the nest. Perhaps,
some day, it will roost again
and ruffle its feathers
tickling the urge to write it again.

Different yet
the sure essence will remain.
Perhaps.
Or, it may be,
forever, gone.
Why I didn't
preserve it when
I had the chance?