THE BUTTERFLY MUSEUM

Reason predicts lapses in reason,
and logic has a weighted right answer.
The idea is to get as many on us as possible.
The butterflies.
They do not land—
We have been crying and they can tell.
You know what you kind of look like? my friend asks me.
Know when you put sunglasses on babies?
We kick around abandoned yellow flower heads,
decaying palm fronds.
I am sickened by their food,
a bowl of sugar water,
the forked fruits.
Sweating in mint shorts with swans,
and a flower in water
like the opening of a folded note,
backbend of petals,
kind to other travelers.