Pipevine swallowtails

Today was one of those days when a rare black swallowtail butterfly decided to cross my path, and flit in front of my car bearing down at 40 miles an hour. Nothing to be done, I saw it flutter to the road and I thought of how not only did I strike down a rare butterfly, I killed the only pollinator of an even rarer plant, the pipevine plant. Both, indelible images from the landscape of my childhood. The carrion-scented pipevine, or Dutchman’s pipe, with its heart-shaped leaves, is the only foodsource of the butterfly, the butterfly, its only pollinator. Their age-old dance is a deep symbiosis that I cannot even begin to fathom.

When I went to pick up my friend for his appointment, another black swallowtail fluttered overhead. I felt that for a moment, that maybe I was forgiven. I drove slowly along the road looking for the one I had struck down, thinking I could at least photograph it in death.  A memento mori. But it was gone, like the shadow of a leaf in the wind. California pipevine swallowtails are melanistic, and in the right light, their sooty wings are fringed with indigo jewels. In many cultures a black butterfly is a symbol of transition, renewal, or rebirth.

To ameliorate that sense of loss, call it unnamed grief, having an hour to kill, I hiked up the fireroad to the ridge above Terra Linda while my friend was in the hospital getting a procedure done. Lately, I’ve been keeping the doldrums at bay with routine and projects. It sneaks in when the pattern is broken. An old friend, Katelin died, and from that, there is no recovery. I walked along the ridge line, gazed back at the iconic shape of Mount Tam, and then north to the broad expanse of Loma Alta Ridge, Sleepy Hollow below me. I dawdled, and took photos of wildflowers and rock outcroppings of Franciscan strata, ribbon chert, and stray blueschist knockers. 

It wasn’t until when I was leaving, that unexpected stop after what you think is your final stop—I doubled back to see the place where an old house once stood on the ridgeline. Near where the front door might’ve stood, a liminal boundary to the east, there were two clumps of white freesias in the grass, that heavenly narcotic scent taking me back to another time, another place, when life was not as painful. Someone once said, let grief come in, and then let it go out again. I have not seen the ocean for over a year. Cease, surcease.

Still feeling blue, I headed back north to prepare for a Sierra Poetry Festival poetry reading for the California Fire & Water anthology reading with Molly Fisk. I joined a little late because I stopped off at Hick’s Valley to feed the Dolcini horses some apples, it was a necessary stop, if only for their soothing animal kindness, and gentle presence, as they snuffed and whuffled, and begged me to itch that one unattainable spot high on their necks for just a little bit longer. 

We breathed in each other’s breath in greeting. Theirs smelled of spring grass, and summer lawns. Mine, of coffee. Their soft eyes, like the deep lakes of the wings of those butterflies, held no judgement, no expectation, other than that of animal companionship. They crowded in, glad for the distraction. Sometimes I forget that deep connection with horses. The unexpected stop made me a little late for the reading, but was necessary for peace of mind.

Some 50 of us poets were electronically joined at the hip via Zoom. We read for the children, we read for the planet we read for the jetstream—that it might find its way back home; we prepare for what is to come. This year, the fire season will arrive too soon and already the hills are losing their greenery. As I listened to the poems, I was lifted out of the doldrums. After the reading, the blues slammed back in, wanting its due—that pound of flesh. But there are indigo skies on the horizon. It is all part of the dance.

There is always tomorrow for the reboot.