Life can be strange. Sometimes things are found where they shouldn’t be. Butterflies do what butterflies do. They know a season and a journey of transformation. I think we see hope in something borne without wings, wrapped in bondage and yet released to fly far in quiet flower-hopping.
Once, on a cold snowy December day, when hope lay shivering in winter’s coffin, I saw a butterfly. Really! I swear I did. Golden brown with two blue spots outlined in green. It led, I followed. The choice was obvious.
I looked upon the fields
of snow and silent seeds,
and dormancy in hush,
as hope fled
in the bleeding of heaviness.
the wind spoke cold in alone
as dreams froze
to cold steel rails
and tools
of rusted labor.
I nodded to the cold blue
of winter sky
and said, “well done, old foe.”
but you looked beyond,
not caring for my sorrow.
and in your indolence,
your arrogance in conquer,
you missed what I could not.
against the backdrop of empty,
in the expanse of extinguish,
it flew on wings of golden brown
and blue-eyed the whisper of hope.
a butterfly in winter.
conceived in Autumn’s dreams,
so far out of season,
impervious to blistered frost
or nature’s harsh order.
it lighted where it would
and laughed to impossible.
it dared the degrees
and cared not for flowers spent.
it’s life was within it’s own,
knowing no dependence
upon the manual.
in the beauty
of broken order,
I followed.
I now know warmth in winter,
snowflakes in July,
and great beauty
in golden brown.
the administrators of this life
wag and hip-swoggle
to our misdeeds
and beauty in chaos.
but we care not.
we fly and we float,
free and fandangled
in seasons
of our own choosing.
~Rick
