Innocence: A Butterfly's Progress

(To Iris Mae and Jethro: cousins, and the two youngest sages in this world)


You were two and five months old
you were riding on my back.
It was the breezy month of May
and butterflies fluttered;
they were
autumn leaves with fairy wings all dandelion-yellow and powdery as
sweet-smelling talcum on your skin

I ran piggyback and you
giggled and laughed as you jiggled and wiggled atop my
wide mama’s back, your
small, chubby arms flapping in the air
you had
butterfly wings, Icarus wings, fearless, undaunted by
gravity’s pull and the torment of small rocks underneath my
feet’s thick soles.

We chased the butterflies, my bare feet thudding, trampling the
soft, soft grass when we disturbed the butterflies
and bugs
On their pre-storm hegira.

Your excited shrieks pierced the cloud-speckled stillness of
the sky
as we gained speed on a yellow one. You

extended your young hands to touch the flapping wings and your
small fingers closed around the feathery body.

you said, mama, look, I got one.
I kneeled in front of you. You
showed me your closed fist. You
opened your little fingers. You…

tried to set the butterfly free. It

fell on top of the soft, soft grass in million powdery feathery yellow pieces

while somewhere hidden in your two-and-five-months-old mind the
butterfly picks up its crushed self
and dandelion-wings carry it through
its pre-storm hegira.-