Reflections of a Butterfly

Early morning...

I am spending a lot of time out in the early morning air lately. The wee hours before the sun actually lights the earth with it's warmth are fresh and cool. The stars seem to shine more brightly just before they disappear behind the light that streams up in golden rays from behind the mountains--like a sunset in "rewind" mode.

I've never really been a morning person. I have woken up slowly, reluctantly, and carefully most of my life, preferring the allure of nighttime to the buoyancy of morning. When I had babies that nursed, I would cuddle them close in those wee hours, eyes sleepily opened to watch them happily suckling their breakfast, often drifting back to sleep with them in my arms; A beautiful peace over me.

This morning, I was caring for a dfferent kind of baby. Not a nurseing child, but a silly, fluffy puppy who needed to relieve himself after a long slumber. I walked around the yard with him at my side, and admired the sky's muted blueness sprinkled with enourmous sparkling stars. The birds were beginning to wake, and the dew in the grass was making my toes moist through the pink flip flops I was wearing. No cars...no voices...no lawn mowers.....no human sounds except for the flopping of my shoes in the grass.

Today was to have been my due date had my babies lived. August 21st. The day that Ramadan begins. An auspicious day. August 21st.

Instead of preparing to give birth, possibly even passing the day with a groan of irritation at being so heavy with child, I am empty. My babies are gone. I will spend the day preparing emotionally to spread ashes of what was once living inside my womb. I thought about the purple and yellow candles I wanted to light for them...and about the balloons I wanted to buy to release into the heavens; a symbol of sending them to my babies who would never see them. Who would never feel the warmth of my milk in their tiny bellies.

I was standing there in the dewy grass...the stars were beginning to fade, and tears were on my cheeks. And then, there it was....warmth. A smooth warm tongue gently caressing my damp toes. I looked down and smiled at the sweet face of my baby Old English Sheepdog. Bright brown eyes twinkling at me from behind an already abundant puff of fur. I could almost hear him saying "It's o.k....I'm here for you." I picked him up and held him. He is such a dear cuddly baby. His weight felt so good in my arms...his baby smell so reassuring.

I brought him inside and lay him down on his little bed next to my own. He flopped down and fell asleep immediately, with the quick breathing that is of a baby. I lay down in my own bed and closed my eyes...hearing his breath....with the crisp wetness of the grass still on my feet.

Yes...It is August 21st.