Caterpillars, tiny astronauts,
harness themselves to fate,
wriggle free from earthly suits
enter orbital sleep
wherein days pass and bodies
melt away
When their capsule doors open,
On spindly legs walks new
creatures awakened
to first flight.
Within their tethered,
brittle, empty pupas
a tiny drop of Milky Way
is always left behind.
-Lynne Shapiro
Lynne Shapiro is a poet from Hoboken, New Jersey. In late summer, she was an artist-in-residence at a Bee-time Arts residency in Santa Lucia, Spain. This year, Origami Poems published a tiny chapbook, Bee Spoke, of work created during a previous Bee Time residency in Southern England. Her work has appeared in such publications as terrain.org, Whole Terrain, Bee Husbandry Magazine and a variety of anthologies, such as Decomposition, a Collection of Fungi Inspired Poetry.
So powerful!🙏🏻❤️