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After the Butterfly Museum
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These are the eyespots,
these the wings,
where iridescence
shines
metallic. One side
camouflage, the other
delicate, fragile—
meant to entice
the Blue Morphos
to mate with one
of its kind.
The eyespots
take to a branch,
close up shop,
suck fruit. Inside
the richest colors a woman
could
imagine. Sewn
together, the two sides,
as each creature
holds, in nature,
light so blinding
it can
only be seen
sidewise.
Too much to ascribe
to the heavy air
circulating false tropics,
yet
more comers continue
to drip slowly
from the mouth
of each golden chrysalis.
They are let go
twice a day,
and when they die
a girl goes around,
picking them up
from walkway
and pond, checking
for damp tissue left
on moss, vermiculite,
and asphalt, patting
down soil beneath angel
trumpets steeped
in honeysuckle and musk
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Judith Skillman is the author of twelve collections of poetry, most recently The White Cypress,
Cervena Barva Press, 2011. She is the recipient of awards from the Academy of American Poets, Washington State Arts Commission,
and other organizations. Her work has appeared in Poetry, FIELD, The Iowa Review, Prairie Schooner, The Midwest Quarterly,
and many other venues. Skillman holds an M.A. in English Literature from University of Maryland, and lives in Kennydale,
Washington. For more on her work, please see www.judithskillman.com
Bird's Eye ReView, 2008-2011. ISSN 1945-2802
All rights reserved.
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