I still remember the first time I saw a Monarch flutter by.
Out of the blue, a tiny magician wearing orange wings dropped by.
Show was free, but did he have to disappear?  "Butterfly?  Butterfly?
Where are you hiding?  Still here, I know!"  I cried.   

When someone told me that my fat, furry caterpillar friend
Was a butterfly waiting to be born,  I fell in love a second time. 
Pull a rabbit out of a hat?  Boring.  Here's a trick where the end
Is the beginning.  "You win!"  I knelt beside Furry and mimed.
           
"Look it up," Teacher said.  "Under ‘Monarch butterfly,’ expect.”
Mumbo-jumbo, mumbo. . . "species," Danaus plexippus," "digitalis." 
But there’s a picture.  Under it, "monarch means king."  All set! 
King tickles, rest is jibberish.  Whoever heard of a "chrysalis?"

In time, I came to love every word.  Butterflies, even more.
But the love has become tarnished by anger, regret, and shame.
If we don't change our ways, all that will be in store
Is barren, gray, empty.  We will forget the magician’s name. 

Not only will we be missing butterflies, but myths that we hold dear.
That keep our dreams alive.  We need to think the souls of the dead
Are near and at peace,  and flying cupids will renew vows to revere
Life-long.  Lives will expand, and outworn shells will be shed. 

Never to see the tawny, dark-veined wings of a see-now-don’t Monarch
Fold together as in prayer?  Walk a tight-wire between leaf and stem
And spy snow-white polka-dots that shimmer so, they set off sparks?
No trees or milkwood, no show. Magician, or anyone to grieve for him.

                                    (c)  Phyllis Jean Green
                                            March, 2010