Butterfly Dreams
Meditations: Day Dreams
© Ilah, 1999
The day was bright and hot, the summer sun beating down with single minded intensity. I can glimpse it in the warmth that lingers in the grass blades beneath my hand as I lower myself to the soft ground of the garden.
The changing of the guard still revolves about me, the fiery day relinquishing his hold only reluctantly to the night's gentler hands. Above, the sky still shades into the brilliant hues of sunset against the horizon, the stars only daring to peek forth in the darkest patches of midnight blue. The moon, fat and heavy, hangs low upon the sky.
But here, where the warmth lingers beneath me and the heady scents of grass and perfume of flowers swirl in an intoxicating blend, the ghosts of the former day may be called forth merely by closing one's eyes. The gardener has come, the sharp smell of clipped grass is everywhere, fresh and green. I breath in deep, let it spill across my tongue as I exhale until it is like the remnant of long forgotten tastes. Far away I can hear the passing of a single car upon the road, the drone of it blending with the closer chirrup of some evening insect.
Transition. The passing of the riotous day to the still of the night. Too often I sleep through it, waking briefly from the death sleep only to pass once more into dozing dreams until the moon rises higher overhead. But to wake at this hour, to rise and walk and see. . . it is a time of relaxation, as the world about me winds slowly to a close. The brilliance of the sunset, so close I might reach out and touch it if only. . . if only. . .
I close my eyes, let the dreams take me. Paint the sky above me a lustrous blue, rich and brilliant and alive with the wings of birds and butterflies, the hum of insects and the pulsing beat of life. Beneath me the ground sings with its own life, the feather touch of small ants, the heated dirt and grasses.
Scent and touch awaken images long gone, until the proud roses against their dark leaves raise their heads and spread their petals to the sunny sky, heady perfume, delicate and heavy. Flowers I have no names for, pink and white and yellow, shades of lavender and cool blue. A rainbow of colors and scents, a feast of experience. In the early evening I recreate them against the canvas of my mind's eye, paint it with the lingering scents of the day and the warmth of the air in a sensation that no mere pigment can capture. Life and brilliance and heat, and I the moth to the flame, longing forever more.
I stretch my arms forth and let the grasses brush against my hands, feel their blades tickle and shiver. The warmth is fading already, the cool of the night descending. I breath again, regretful. The difference is so small but so telling. Scent of the night, of the moon and stars, of the still quiet of the evening. With the warmth goes the vibrancy, the frantic stirring life. The colors in my dream fade and darken.
Opened eyes reveal the moon gliding higher in her path, surrounded on all sides by her glittering court of stars as they pay her homage. The sunset has faded from all but the most stubborn blue tints against the horizon, the soft lights along the garden path springing into life with the falling darkness. Night, and already I can hear the others stirring within the house, the death sleep relinquishing us all once again.
I let my head fall back, close my eyes, but the dream has slipped away with the retreat of sun. Banished into the realm of dreams upon waking, there to rest until sleep should call it forth once more.
My hand brushes softness as I stretch once more and I turn my head to look. A milkweed bud, aged into a sphere of feathery spores, nods heavily back at me. Silvery in the strengthening moonlight, it is the lone refugee from the gardener's blades. A memory stirs in the darkened recesses of time long gone - a distant memory of something played out beneath rich blue skies. A child's game, perhaps, but the memory slips away like a ghost through my grasp. Silly things. Wishes carried on summer breezes.
The garden is still and quiet in the gathering night, the rich air as yet unbroken by any heartbeat but my own.
I draw in a breath filled with the scents and flavors of the sun drenched day and let it out in a quick stream. The tiny bits of fluff pull free, dancing upon the air; iridescent fragments of feathery day dreams released upon the indigo stream of the night.