![Great Mormon Butterfly [Papilio Memnon]](https://berniegourley.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/img_0372.jpg)
Great Mormon
flaps its wings spastically,
yet hovers in place.
Great Mormon [Haiku]
3
Tag Archives: insect
Forfeit [Haiku]
brown moth blends against bare earth,
'til footfall tremor sends it lurching.
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Transitory [Haiku]
butterfly lands
on flower, pumps wings twice,
and sputters off.
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“To a Butterfly” by William Wordsworth [w/ Audio]
Stay near me—do not take thy flight!
A little longer stay in sight!
Much converse do I find in Thee,
Historian of my Infancy!
Float near me; do not yet depart!
Dead times revive in thee:
Thou bring'st, gay Creature as thou art!
A solemn image to my heart,
My Father's Family!
Oh! pleasant, pleasant were the days,
The time, when in our childish plays
My sister Emmeline and I
Together chased the Butterfly!
A very hunter did I rush
Upon the prey:—with leaps and springs
I follow'd on from brake to bush;
But She, God love her! feared to brush
The dust from off its wings.
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Grasshopper [Haiku]
“The earth has many keys” (1775) by Emily Dickinson [w/ Audio]
The earth has many keys,
Where melody is not
Is the unknown peninsula.
Beauty is nature's fact.
But witness for her land,
And witness for her sea,
The cricket is her utmost
Of elegy to me.
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Orbit [Haiku]
butterflies orbit
in helter-skelter arcs,
but never bump.
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Jungle Spotlight [Haiku]
butterfly on the jungle floor,
warmed by a shaft of light.
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“Illusion” by Amy Lowell [w/ Audio]
Walking beside the tree-peonies,
I saw a beetle
Whose wings were of black lacquer spotted with milk.
I would have caught it,
But it ran from me swiftly
And hid under the stone lotus
Which supports the Statue of Buddha.
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“Come slowly — Eden!” (205) by Emily Dickinson [w/ Audio]
Come slowly -- Eden!
Lips unused to Thee --
Bashful -- sip thy Jessamines --
As the fainting Bee --
Reaching late his flower,
Round her chamber hums --
Counts his nectars --
Enters -- and is lost in Balms.
Tiger Riding for Beginners 