Thick on the forest trees in Mexico,
Clustered on trunk and branch, as if they grow
 
Like some exotic epiphyte, or issue
Extravagantly from the ligneous tissue,
 
Incalculable monarch butterflies
Wake and display their colours to surprise
 
The early sun. And as its rays recall
Warmth to their torpid wings, a waterfall
 
Of intricate design begins to pour,
As though to spill onto the forest floor,
 
Until their wings, responding to the feel
Of air, take hold and lift them and they peel
 
Away, in millions, buoyed and jostled on
The light, unfolding a phenomenon
 
Almost beyond perception, which defies
Imagining: the noise of butterflies,
 
The faintest intimation of a breath,
Less sound than silence audible. At death,
 
The Aztecs thought the human soul, as I
Have somewhere read, becomes a butterfly,
 
Or dwells in one, but cannot long delay
Its dissolution, and soon drains away.
 
After such brutal practices, how brief,
How frail and unambitious a belief
 
To cling to when the breath of life departs,
Or answer for the tearing out of hearts.