You've once recounted in memory
with that young boy vigor
of a hobby collection of that sort.

I find it fascinating how you could
maintain our feigned interest in naivety.
You kept us so long in silence.

You've kept all these things in
jars and cabinets packed in
tight spaces.

And as little and as inconsequential
that butterfly memory that you kept
in a bright jar up in your attic;

let that ripple strengthen into a wave
but i will never be what you willed
and kept for so long. A butterfly

clipped and dipped in formalin
for your tiny framed collection,
that pride-start, if you even had one.

-19FEB15