Shouldn't…but Do

Mid-morning Friday on the loveliest autumnal day you ever saw, Mr. Saturday Night and a sibling emerged from stillness.

The bejeweled chrysalis that contained their transformation became crunchy, clear debris.  Organic artifact to changing times.

Home from school sick, my oldest and I marveled at the still-wet sheets of orange and black silken wings.  With such utterly different form, I could not help but wonder what those now-winged former caterpillars might be thinking, feeling – in their way.

When my youngest arrived home,  the jars were conveyed to the launch pad – a large Agastache plant in full bloom.  With a bigger body and wingspan than its cohort, Mr. Saturday Night fumbled a bit as they clung to flowers in the breeze.

Within minutes each butterfly flew up to a quaking aspen, it’s yellow mottled leaves of autumn offering perfect camouflage.  The two swayed gently up and down until dusk,  then disappeared into the garden.

As they moon rose and its siblings took to the sky, I brought the deteriorating chrysalis of Hunny Bear into the garden and nestled it under the milkweed plant upon which it was born, and once saw the sun, the moon,  maybe felt the breeze.

Butterfly number three emerged early yesterday morning, anxious to be off.  Born to run, there was no hanging around for him.  Crawling off my hand onto the launch pad, he was aloft and southbound in minutes.

This afternoon monarch butterflies, one, then two, gliding about my garden from time to time.  I have to smile.