Poems by Zoe Boyer

Caution, Butterflies

by Zoe Boyer

From Canary Fall 2021

Zoe grew up on the land of the Council of the Three Fires: the Potawatomi, Ojibwe, and Odawa Nations, where she sailed and paddled on Lake Michigan. She now lives on the land of the Yavapai-Apache Nation in the Verde River watershed, tucked among the ponderosa pines.

Just when I've grown accustomed to the unlikely green of the
world beyond my windows—summer’s brown and burn
displaced by monsoon rain—nature outdoes itself with a
Jackson Pollock spatter of yellow flung across the yard:

cloudless sulphur butterflies flitting through the trees, color
rioting on wings, acid-bright and incandescent as the sun.

Remarkable to think they are masters of disguise, petal-hued
as their favorite feast of senna, when here against the somber
green of juniper and pine they blaze bright as supernovae;

bold enough to stop traffic, bold as the sign sprouting
daffodil-like on Highway One urging: Caution, Butterflies;
a yellow like a warning to wake from the stupor of another
dull day and pay heed to the world’s flash and flutter.