Poetry of Issue #7        Page 18

FLYING SOLO

I see one butterfly,
flying low and determinedly,
perhaps in a southerly direction,
though its path isn’t straight.
It zigzags and flits.

I can’t get a good look,
because it is in silhouette,
but the shape of its wings
suggests it is a monarch butterfly,
and the direction of its flight
indicates it’s heading to Mexico,
where it will join millions of others,
coating fir trees in a slumber,
until it is time to wake and return north.

But right now this one specimen
is alone, winging its heart out
to get to its wintering ground.

  Thaddeus Rutkowski