School, softball, 
   stress: overwhelming.
     Washed away with wads of worries,
        I loiter in the butterfly vivarium, vaguely
          comprehensive, entering the moist, tropical zone.
             A child, smiling, skips senselessly behind me,
                grasping onto his mother’s hand.
                  Life: so simple for the boy.
                  Life: so simple for the butterflies.
                   I find peace in the waterfall,
                    the lively sounds of the rich rainforest,
                     and the butterflies fluttering like a winter blizzard.
                   A dream: a kid again…worry free.
                   A dream: happiness…pure and long.
                A butterfly tickles my nose, and flaps its wings.
            A flashback: chasing fireflies in the backyard.
            A flashback: belief of everlasting summer.
          I’m the last one in the vivarium,
        paralyzed by the simplicity,
      and the youth of the zone.
     I must keep my childhood
   as one wing;
and adulthood,
as the other.