Saviour of the Butterfly
On a dark, melancholic night,
she sat completely still.
Earnest.
Head up,
eyes frozen,
lips sealed,
breath silenced,
hands crossed,
ankles shackled,
heart blindfolded,
brain screaming nonsense,
occupied with millions of thoughts
Loud and monotonous.
Everybody had told her
to stop listening to her heart;
that emotion,
though fluid, has to be caged;
though wild, has to be tamed.
Her skin cracked in protest,
and a white butterfly
with a damaged wing
fell at her feet,
voiceless,
almost invisible.
She didn't notice
the fluttering butterfly,
for her brain was screaming:
"Run!"
Her brain was racing,
chasing time,
anxious and out of breath,
blurring her vision with illusions.
"Run!"
Her brain screamed again,
and, thus, she stood up
so abruptly she lost herself in vertigo;
and, moving her foot,
she heard
a voice.
"Mind the butterfly!"
the voice echoed,
yet her head was frozen,
her skin was breaking
under the pressure of
heavy, anticipating stares,
twisted and eager to judge;
their lips were, slowly,
breaking into crooked,
predatory smiles:
ready to devour her,
to feed on her innocent mistakes.
"Save the butterfly!"
The muffled voice repeated,
rushed through the air,
to shield the blurred butterfly,
and she almost took a blind step
when his arm spread in time
to shelter the broken butterfly.
She gazed in awe
into his eyes.
His eyes were, cloudless, untamed;
free to flow all over the space,
to submerge the world with
lucid cleansing emotion.
His hands, warm and open,
ready to inhale the universe,
were guarding the delicate butterfly
with the greatest care.
Within the skies of his boundless palms,
the butterfly exhaled the dust of pain.
Elixir of life rushed through its wings,
spreading them to embrace the sky,
and yet he was a king
with a million things to do.
He was a king,
real, adored, and prosperous:
never has he ever
stepped on a broken butterfly.
Copyright © Zainab Wasel Ali | Year Posted 2024
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