Image credit: Sergey Velikanov/Shutterstock.com

I cannot tell you what it is to be a butterfly girl.

My lips are closed when words might be spoken and only open at their command for other services. My eyes shut more often than they allow in light, for there is precious little of that in any case. My ears debar sounds except their commands.

I cannot communicate this to you.

So you think me a normal girl in a halloween costume. A beautiful, whimsical display that is innocent and transformative. But if I allow you more than a moment to gaze into my tear stained eyes you would know. There is nothing of the innocent left here. It is all long gone, burnt out on altars hidden within the depths.

When the butterfly emerges from the cocoon it is only after the caterpillar has been annihilated utterly. Think on that if you would understand me.

If you would understand us. For there are many, many butterflies, roaming these dark streets. Many not as beautiful nnd colourful as I, but still the same, under the skin, in the underneath, where only their darkness may reach.

Butterflies have such brief lives. Pure beauty for a day. We grow old we think, but to our cold dismay find even that must be replicated. The analogy must be complete, for that is perfection.

Age does weary us, and the years condemn.

And you won’t remember me, just as you don’t remember them.

(c) Helen M Valentina (2016)