Where Have the Butterflies Gone

Where Have the Butterflies Gone?

As a child, I saw you in our garden

The marigolds heaved with your wings

I’d count up your different varieties

as you went about butterfly things

Common cabbage-whites mingled with monarchs

and those yellow ones, what were they called?

Watching for hours, in the African sun,

what child could ever grow bored?

One day, I shrieked with excitement,

my butterfly book yanked out in my glee.

“Mom, I promise, I saw a giant swallow tail!”

(A sight of extreme rarity!)

Inevitably I wanted to collect you

but felt guilty when I saw you were dead

and my revulsion was totally unparalleled

when supportive mom shoved pins through your head

That saw the end of my interest...

but I should have watched more in those sunny days

for you seem to have gone from our gardens.

Where have the butterflies gone to these days?

© Catherine Knee