Why Butterflies?

Books, Blogs and Butterflies.

Books, yes. They’re coming.

Blogs? Yes. The blog is up and running.

But Butterflies? Why butterflies?

Because, when my wife was in the middle stages of Alzheimer’s disease, she flitted about like a butterfly – pestering me with ‘A’ question, fussing with this, fumbling with that, sorting her jewellery, pestering me with A question, fussing with this, fumbling with that, sorting her jewellery…

The comparison became quite obvious.

So, since poetry had become my outlet, I endeavoured to write a poem about that.

But it did not come easily. This was not one of those poems that “just comes,” or “writes itself.” I jotted down this thought, pursued that thread, thunk up alternate connective thoughts, changed the rhyme pattern…abandoned it.

Later, I tried again. I caught a phrase, noted a theme…I wrote and wrote.

Soon I had pages of “stuff,” false starts, completed verses, dissonant thoughts and lines…

I abandoned it.

Eventually, as the butterfly connection flitted about in my brain, I returned to my pages of “stuff.” I plowed through it. I grabbed onto a verse. It seemed to connect with another, unfinished thought/verse. I put them together. Something clicked and before I knew it, I was on a roll.

Came a point when it felt like I was finished. I bounced out of The Zone. Yep. It looked like a keeper, even though it included only a fraction of the “stuff” on those pages.

I worked on that to get the flow flowing just right, pattern to fit, theme and thought to work. I left it.

Later, I tried it on. I read it to The Group. The Group made a mistake. They displayed outright approval. Some members were visibly moved by it.

Okay. It’s a keeper. Such acknowledgment and affirmation cannot be denied.

Like a Butterfly

But still, I had that leftover “stuff” on those pages.

Eventually I went back to it. I repeated the above process, more or less, and voila! I had a second butterfly poem.

Same procedure. Read it to The Group. The Group made a mistake. They displayed outright approval. Some members were visibly moved by it. Including a young man. So I figured I had a winner when he said after the meeting, “It was the butterfly that got me.”

My Butterfly

When I was putting my poems together as a book, and when I landed on the title, Chasing a Butterfly, I realized that I really needed a Title Poem.

And what shall I call this title poem, Herb?

Why,

Chasing a Butterfly,

of course.

And so, from a little girl chasing a butterfly across the meadow to a middle-aged woman chasing around like a butterfly, to an old woman in a wheelchair chasing a metaphorical butterfly…

A poem was born.

After all that, I decided to turn my poems into a play. I did that, and while doing so, I realized that I needed yet another butterfly poem. To “close it off.”

And so came the the need to let go. In the end, we need to let go.

To

Let the Butterfly Fly.

To free her, to celebrate her freedom, to free the mind, release her spirit…to let her fly…

To be free of guilt and shame and remorse…

And grief…

And that is why Butterflies.

Besides, both are endangered species.