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The Flight Of The Monarch Butterflies

by Parth Pandya

Parth Pandya draws upon the migration and the linear lifecycle of Monarch Butterflies and compares this to the human journey, which is never only about the future but is also a lot about the past.

Each year it happens this way
Each year those million monarchs
Are born, sprout wings, and fly off
To a warm place, a continent away

Something living goes there, puts down its luggage
Collapses on the bed, kicks off its shoes
Orders room service, hatches some progenies
And then without apology, promptly dies

A life with no correction,
No retraction, no redemption
No reset, no egress
No nostalgia, no regrets

We too could be monarchs
We too could journey with no return
Never turn to wonder at ‘what if’
Never have a chance to go back

And yet, nature’s scripts for us differ
Not for us the singular sense of purpose
Our journeys are bound to a leash
Our future tied to the past

Fly, O Monarch, fly to your tenacious end
We fly forward only to look back
We travel in circles, in our hearts
Our beginnings married to our end

Parth Pandya is a passionate Tendulkar fan, diligent minion of the ‘evil empire’, persistent writer at http://parthp.blogspot.com, self-confessed Hindi movie geek, avid quizzer, awesome husband (for lack of a humbler adjective) and a thrilled father of two. He grew up in Mumbai and spent the last eleven years really growing up in the U.S. and is always looking to brighten up his day through good coffee and great puns. 

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