SAYING GOODBYE TO BUTTERFLIES

When I was a child,
I loved everything about butterflies,
their magical wings, their lustrous colors,
but never pondered their life cycle,
or where they went each fall,

like a game of peekaboo,
they were here one minute,
gone the next,

my young mind easily moved on
to the next wondrous thing,
a chittering squirrel,
a leaping grasshopper,
a hopping bunny,
a vine bursting with pumpkins
just in time for Halloween,

it wasn’t until I was older
that saying goodbye to butterflies
was accompanied by feelings of melancholy,

I worried about their arduous flight to Mexico;
whether or not their delicate wings would sustain them,

you see, I had lived long enough by then
to understand that not all stories have a happy ending,
and that sometimes saying goodbye
could be for the very last time.

Photo by Marti Durkee Garvey (my very talented sister-in-law)
See more of her art on Instagram: @momartiphotos
and on Tumbler: momartiphotos.tumblr.com

Wonder Girl

The questions flow with earnest ease
from a girl who just turned five,

she wonders why she’s on the ground,
when birds can fly so high,

she wonders where the rainbow ends,
and why she loves fresh pie,

she wonders how the flowers grow
when summer days draw ‘nigh,

she wonders what she ought to do
when a good friend starts to cry,

she wonders why some folks get sick
and why they sometimes die,

she wonders why the moon’s so bright
in the silvery, starlit sky.