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This hazy mid-July
afternoon by the lake
I am sitting on my porch
watching a lone
orange and black monarch
dart back and forth
back and forth across the lawn
I can’t think of anything
in nature that looks
more futile and mad as
this butterfly’s flight
the frenzied zigzagging
reaching altitude and
dropping in an instant
papery oversized wings
and spindly body batting
spasmodically
against unpredictable
currents circling
in jagged flapping
up and down patterns
a game of snakes and ladders
going nowhere;
After some frantic time
it finally comes to rest
on the broken branch
of a dead leafless
ash tree wings slowly
inflating/deflating
like wasted heaving lungs.
The sun slips behind
distant blue-green mountains,
I am thinking
of a conversation we had
one time when we
hiked those switchback
ascending trails and you
leading with me behind
said, we have no choice
we have to live
with it now, live
with what you said
with what I said
there’s no going back
it’s the requirement of love
and just then
the monarch lifted off
as if to provide
royal assent
for our decision
to keep trying.
3 comments:
Nice description of the movements of the butterfly, which later take on extra significance in light of the human relationship and the difficult decision they have to make. The switchbacks in the mountains is also a subtle echo of the same wavering as expressed by jagged movements.
The only line I don't like is the one about "snakes and ladders". You broke the spell of the butterfly with an all too human game reference. But, on the other hand, now that I think about it, the snakes and ladders, like the butterfly, like the switchback, like the couple, also present a jagged visual. I just found it jarring on the first reading ... which, again, is perhaps what you were going for.
In terms of a companion poem, I am shocked to discover that even though I think of myself as a worshipper of Nature, I have written very little in terms of Nature poetry. I guess I have always felt like it's been done already so well by the Romantics and as well by more modern poets like Mary Oliver (whom I mostly like, but sometimes find heavy-handed).
So, I am working on a Nature poem ... it's coming. I have a few ideas.
So this is 100% inspired by your poem. You got me thinking about butterflies, and I was trying to imagine a child's first experiences and first impressions. Anyway, here's what I came up with ... you are welcome to make changes or suggestions if you like since it's after all kind of your poem too.
Butterfly
The smallest of children understands,
She doesn’t need the words.
She knows.
Before she tries to describe it,
She knows what it is,
Before she has a word for it,
She knows.
The creature works with flowers,
And is dressed appropriately.
The creature dances and dangles in mid-air.
She knows.
The child wants to touch it,
To feel it alive in her hands.
She holds it in her hands for an astonishing instant,
But the colored scales rub off like powder
And she knows she has done something wrong.
She knows.
She will not easily forget this feeling.
No.
From that moment onward, she will know
That these creatures have their own place.
That place with no walls, no doors,
No ceilings, no floors.
Lovely poem, Kelp. Very resonant on multiple levels. That repetition of 'she knows' and then echoed with 'No' and the rhymes at the end, with the repeated 'O' sounds, the 'O' of awe, and the "O" of zero, of ignorance (of bliss?). All of it got me thinking about what we know and don't know, intutively, what that first 'No' as a child from a parent (or other authority figure) might do to our sense of intuitive knowing, the doubt and self-consciousness it creates in us, something that becomes indelible for the rest of our lives. And of course there are the biblical echoes of Eden and the Fall, banishment from the garden. Lovely.
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