The Chrysalis

Complex and real. Contradictory - which I think you intended - with its "surfaces" and inwardness, and the "rough/smooth." It's sad how the end result is so fragile - paper - even if there are a thousand of them... a fractional self... and a forgotten self (second stanza).

I find it interesting that the forming of skin over the speaker's unknown essence is considered a grief. It seems to say something about humanity: its fragility, its brevity. This is supported by the next sentence where the speaker takes pleasure in her/his own pulse ("delicate...throb"). When a heart bursts, typically that means a death, the end of a pulse.

I see a possible clue to the origin of the speaker (the origin that is questioned) in the paper butterflies - story, or words, or language, a strong yet seemingly fleeting/impermanent entity. People need stories... and people typically turn inward when their personal story is falling apart. Survival creates a new story (paper butterflies).

So I see this poem as either morbid or triumphant. I don't really know which interpretation I like better.

<3

Thanks for the analysis!

I left a lot of this inentionally nebulous so that it would contradictory, as you said. I hadn't thought of this poem in the terms that you have, but I like the angle.
What I mean by nebulous and vague..."The rough greif/Of smooth skin", for instance. I didn't want to say whether it was my own skin, or someone else's. Ditto for the imagry of the temple. Whose temple? Mine? A lover?

You're right in that this can either be read as morbid or triumphant. Personally, I meant it in a triumphant way. The butterflies are the culmination of the inward turning, turning myself into a chrysalis and sealing up. The "raw red heart" and "bruised chest" are meant to conjur up images of past pain, the need to curl inward for protection, the necessity of becoming self-involved. This is a kind of death. The old sense has lived too long. Time for something else.
But! Still, my heart is beating high. I personally see it through a more hopeful lense...fully aware of the pain of the past, but finally able to put something out there into the world in one sharp ecstatic burst. The old self dies, but a thousand new facets are formed.

(By "I" I mean the speaker of the poem. I mean, this is sort of a confessional poem, but like I said, I'd like to think it's vague enough that the speaker could be anybody, depending on his/her point of view. I'm just trying to give you my view when I wrote it.)


I like that you can see the duality here. That makes me happy...because I did my job!

Thanks for reading and responding in such depth, Merry. :)

xxx