The Season’s First Monarch

Yesterday or the day before
I saw the season’s first monarch
flying slowly, flapping slowly,
through the sunlight and thick shadows
beneath some tall trees near my house.

All monarch butterflies fly west
to California or southwest
to Mexico. (Just like all eels
trip off to the Sargasso Sea.)

Scientists don’t have a clue why
monarchs migrate. (Or why eels do.)

I’ve talked to some scientists who
think modern cognitive studies
have shed some light on why people
engage in writing behavior.
They talk about brain chemicals,
dynamic equilibrium,
beautiful catastrophic cusps
and other impressive chatter.

I think writing is migration,
flapping off to California,
(squirming off to the Sargasso)
getting to some strange, special place,
looking to spend strange, special time
with strange, special other people
on the same impossible trip.

Yesterday or the day before
I saw the season’s first monarch
flying slowly, flapping slowly,
through the sunlight and thick shadows
beneath some tall trees near my house.

This morning I worked out these lines.
I feel a little closer now.
But I don’t have a clue to where
and I don’t have a clue to who.

I think it’s an open question—
That is, do the monarchs (and eels)
know more about where they’re going
and more about why they’re going
than people who do stuff like this?

I wonder if that butterfly
wondered about where I’d end up?