©Hazel Henderson, 1991
A pair of butterflies
Pollinating, propagating,
Flitting above
The long procession of cultures
Find themselves on pious, glorious day
Scanning the vast blue Bay
That Drake “discovered”
For the English.
Today it teems
With myriad sights, sounds and smells
Cable cars and seafood-sated pilgrims,
Multitudes of sails and wings.
Traders all,
Some human-scaled, warm vendors
Schooled in China’s ancient way.
Some grown monstrous,
Dinosaurs drably-garbed
In faceless buildings
In a dark canyon
They call “Montgomery.”
An odd couple
Meeting in mythic space.
This Isis and Osiris
Wend a way named “Grant”
Dodging firecrackers,
And dancing sneakered dragons
Right at home, trading, scenting,
Feeling out the nectar.
Finding Holy Pollen in a treasure trove
Of old earrings and long-lost
Oriental silks.
Homely treasures these,
Celebrating the Human Family
To stash away, re-form and then
Re-offer to the world.
These butterflies in friendly hordes
Dance ahead of cultures
Up and down history’s colonnades
Attracting and seducing,
Pointing to new ways,
Beckoning new Elysian Fields.
Clouds of gentle, happy warriors,
Transmuting raw power to songs
And visions of Becoming.
Many follow, some curious,
Some with nets
Seeking to capture and
Impale the flitting wings.
But the alchemists elude–now
Slippery FISH!
Their enzyme mission asks
That they be free.
Free to love the universal Grail
Free to weave the sacred threads
That bind all life
On many-splendored GAIA.
So they flutter on
Dancing, sipping earthly joys, and fears
Dreams and nightmares,
Swimming in the dark
Cycling and re-cycling seeds, ideas,
Earth gems and flowers
Arrowheads lost in burial grounds and strife
All blooming unseen.
Re-arranging Earth’s treasures
Painting feather flags
Of Universal Life.
The two are humble creatures yet,
Decked not in gorgeous monarchs’ wings,
But in simple guise
As common yellow butterflies.
To better attune to other
Mortal beings.
Commonsense for all
Who can hear their call:
A simple song in praise of beauty
And evolution’s
Ever-lasting faith.
New Adam and New Eve.
Ever shifting cultures of the past
In awe and wonder
Re-discover the sacred scriptures
In a Polynesian Boat,
A Hopi Ceremony.
Wild Man and Wild Woman.
At home in many jungles:
Of culture, concrete or greenery.
Both strong and fragile
Forever loving and
Forever Free.
New Man and New Woman
Fierce in their pledge to care
To nurture the future’s rare
Unfolding.
Both praise Change and
Sing Mutation’s ode
While honoring DNA’s stable living code.
They sing anew of the Divine Child
For babies everywhere anew,
For all the world’s eternal young
For ever-changing GAIA, blue
Earth Mother
Orbiting in our hearts
And in Eternity.