Joy
The asters shake from stem to flower
waiting for the monarchs to alight.
Every butterfly knows that the end
is different from the beginning
and that it is always a part
of a longer story, in which we are always
transformed. When it's time to fly,
you know how, just the way you knew
how to breathe, just the way the air
knew to find its way into your lungs,
the way the geese know when to depart,
the way their wings know how to
speak to the wind, a partnership of feather
and glide, lifting into the blue dream.
waiting for the monarchs to alight.
Every butterfly knows that the end
is different from the beginning
and that it is always a part
of a longer story, in which we are always
transformed. When it's time to fly,
you know how, just the way you knew
how to breathe, just the way the air
knew to find its way into your lungs,
the way the geese know when to depart,
the way their wings know how to
speak to the wind, a partnership of feather
and glide, lifting into the blue dream.
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Disclaimer
We do not accept unsolicited submissions. American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2019 by Stuart Kestenbaum, "Joy," from How to Start Over, (Deerbrook Editions, 2019). Poem reprinted by permission of Stuart Kestenbaum and the publisher. Introduction copyright © 2024 by The Poetry Foundation.