"My sensitive little butterfly"
my gorgeous swedish jamaican friend michaela
from london {we met in paris} who recently
relocated to toronto, sent me an email
the other day, it began:
"My sensitive little butterfly,"
and i was immediately touched
and elusively enlightened by the gentle
nature of her words, the image fluttering
in my subconscious, their delicate resonance
in the back of my mind ever since.
so deeply, impossibly, sensitive, i go
through life, just coming out of a cocoon
not sure how strong these wings are
or how far they will carry me,
i know they sparkle in the sunlight,
at times i know their colors, yet
if fluttering wings could stumble,
then certainly that would mine,
feel as though, they've been heavy
sitting on this branch forever, watching.
the delicate flapping wings of delightful flight
the world finds its purpose
and the wind carries it with pride
at times i find the momentum
to fly, in moments you fly beside me
yet too often i wish
the cocoon was still there and i
could crawl back inside and disappear.
you know how they say,
the exact words don't come to me now,
but something to the extent of,
the butterfly effect, and the notion of how
the effect that the gentle fluttering
of the colorful wings, a single butterfly
can change the winds of destiny...
so too i find, even the smallest of my actions,
have the effect of something that,
though i hardly meant to flutter,
is so greatly felt by others,
in the furthest from intended, desired of ways,
the gentle flapping, propels a painful force
and yet in moments when i least expect,
the soft quiet of fluttering changes
and subtle movement, delight
in a refreshing breeze stronger than
initially perceived, a breath of hope
for the next, the fateful winds of discovery.
such fluttering effects of both winds, perpetual,
occur multiple times in one single day
the direction becomes, for the next moment
unclear, no clear path in the expansive sky
the brilliant colors of my wings seem, to me, dull,
lifeless, powerless, without significance,
then from the secluded darkness,
pressing walls of my cocoon, that hold me here lost,
the lull, the words of a proverb
permeate, find entrance to awaken me
“Just when the caterpillar
thought the world was over,
it became a butterfly.”
and when awakened, the words
spoken in a flutter by thoreau,
float past me too, and enter
my deepest of longing, my lonely cocoon
“Happiness is like a butterfly:
the more you chase it, the more it will elude you,
but if you turn your attention to other things,
it will come and sit softly on your shoulder…”
and i stop fluttering my wings for a moment,
in reflection, not fully convinced but all at once
in benevolent anticipation,
in desperate hope that the next
faint flutter will mean... that something
...that soft something of my waking dreams
in my subconscious, their delicate resonance
if fluttering wings could stumble,
and subtle movement, delight
at times i find the momentum
the exact words don't come to me now,
my deepest of longing, my lonely cocoon
"it will come and sit softly on your shoulder…”
...that soft something of my waking dreams
"My sensitive little butterfly."
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