caterpillar soup

exhale all hope

push it out

birth the death

of you

 

fall back

backwards

in one last act

of trust

 

into the embrace

of the abyss

sink now

into sweet release

 

inevitable darkness

falls

like

rain

 

an eternal shadow

not just blocking

but eliminating

the light

 

here in this

shroud

faith

finally tested

 

and at this moment

no one

no one

will come

 

save your

own

disintegrating

self

 

to invite you

to

dance

with demise

 

singing this song

 

come

 

let’s make

caterpillar soup

 

Notes: Poem inspired by an article in Scientific American

Here’s a snippet. For the full article follow the link above.

“But what does that radical transformation entail? How does a caterpillar rearrange itself into a butterfly? What happens inside a chrysalis or cocoon?

First, the caterpillar digests itself, releasing enzymes to dissolve all of its tissues. If you were to cut open a cocoon or chrysalis at just the right time, caterpillar soup would ooze out. But the contents of the pupa are not entirely an amorphous mess. Certain highly organized groups of cells known as imaginal discs survive the digestive process. Before hatching, when a caterpillar is still developing inside its egg, it grows an imaginal disc for each of the adult body parts it will need as a mature butterfly or moth—discs for its eyes, for its wings, its legs and so on.”