1.
Butterfly.
Fifty years ago you gave me a butterfly
newly hatched from the chrysalis
you had stored discretely in an old shoe box
locked away in the cupboard on the third floor landing
out of sight of your father,
a retired army officer who thought that teen aged girls
should not indulge their time in scientific experiments
but should learn to cook and sew.
The butterfly still lives,
a strange fluttering enigma that awakes me late at night
when she takes a break from her hide away
close by the iron fireplace in my bedroom,
the same room where we slept together when we got the
chance.
I sometimes think this butterfly is just a figment
of my wild imagination,
my dream afflicted mind,
seventy years and more but still determinedly adolescent
and unable to understand
that the Past has packed up every bag and gone.
But your gift is still here with me, undeniably alive,
a little out of sorts now, but truer than that savage "goodbye"
letter
your father made you write
when he found out that we planned to start a family
without a "by your leave",
and that we thought his take on life was very out of date,
and not worthy of real consideration.
from time to time we managed to meet up,
from time to time we hogged the telephone,
but years ago I misplaced your address,
and I cannot store phone numbers in my head.
Then last night, as I lay awake, I had a most vivid premonition,
that you will soon come brusquely knocking on my door,
your face and shoulders tanned from foreign travel,
your coal black hair white as Alpine snow;
and that you will lift up your butterfly in long and delicate
fingers
to carry her out into my sunlit garden
where she can shimmy and glide among the roses
as to the manner born.
Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
August 22nd. - 23rd.-25th. 2016.
No comments:
Post a Comment