Illusion — Summary

Walking beside tree-peonies, the speaker notices a beetle whose wings look like black lacquer dotted with milk. She immediately wants to catch it—not out of cruelty, but because it is striking and rare. The beetle, though, darts away and disappears under a stone lotus that supports a statue of Buddha. That final image matters: the creature escapes into a space connected with stillness and reverence, as if beauty cannot be owned, only witnessed for a moment. The speaker is left with a quiet sense of loss, but also wonder. The mood is intimate and hushed, like holding your breath in a garden. The title “Illusion” hints that what we long to possess—especially fleeting beauty—often slips through our fingers, and perhaps the wiser response is simply to let it go.