The sun was shining and I was free and warm,
chasing little yellow butterflies
alongside the garden where my mother was working,
a source of food for our family
along with factory pay and Saturday night band gigs
with bare feet and lilacs I rose above it,
watching myself, a small child caught up in her world,
thoughts and music floating with purpose
uninterrupted wondering if there was another
version of me doing the exact same thing
at that exact same moment,
in China, in India, in Africa,
although I did not know the names of such places,
I knew the pictures of dark skin and brightly colored
clothing, from the Encyclopedia Britannica's
prominently positioned in the
bookshelf, center of our living room
and it seemed that I could feel the other “me’s”
that we knew each other and spoke via the
sound tunnels created by earth worms
and the encyclopedia girls seemed happy too,
simply to be alive, dancing to their songs
yet there seemed to me another, quasi Diane,
this one not so different, nor so far away,
but she was beyond my grasp, and unable to hear me,
and I felt a vivid, deep longing for her,
eventually, after minutes of chasing, the butterflies
could no longer be found, remembering reality
I was sad for a moment, but I imagined that
one must have fluttered off
to that other little girl
through the hole in the air that I could not see
and I smiled, hoping she would be able to catch it.
It occurred to me only after writing and then reading this poem, that this experience occurred (around age 5), before some childhood trauma and it reads back to me that I had sent a yellow butterfly to my future self as a reminder of innocence and happiness. This is both chilling and comforting.