Caterpillar Dies, Butterfly emerges-A documentary-of sorts, A Meditation/Reflection & a Poem

Sure, it is an ordinary, common happening. Right?  A caterpillar eats his fill after two weeks, growing from a mere speck to a comparatively huge, wormy like creature, with 16 legs and antennae on the front and back sides.  The caterpillar spins a sticky silk substance from which he hangs upside down in the shape of a J, and then begins to emit a liquid from the mouth, that defies gravity, covering almost the entire body in it’s casing.

I was never lucky enough to witness that part of the process, it seems to happen very quickly.  What I did notice is that the casing at first looks like a beautiful wax paper and has a spiral of yellow amidst the green, at the top.

For 10 to 12 days the cocoon hangs quietly.  At some point in the early part of those days, the yellow spiral at the top disappears, and the cocoon becomes more solid looking and polished.  And quite amazingly, gold designs appear along the top edge like a necklace, with a few, it seems, carefully placed gold dots – along the bottom.  This is real gold color, as if through the death of the caterpillar, the promise of the new life is given evidence by gems of a sort.

We know all of these things, yet when you witness them closely, the reality and depth of it is strengthened.

The most stunning realization of all, though, is that the caterpillar really does die in there.  The caterpillar becomes completely liquidated.  Pause.  Complete liquid!   To imagine that the caterpillar loses all form unto liquid and then reforms(!!!) into a perfectly encapsulated butterfly is really mind boggling.  This really is one of the most powerful statements in nature.

The other surprising detail my daughter Samara, and I noticed in our witnessing of  two monarch caterpillars going through the transmutation was, that the cocoon is so small!  The cocoon is half, verging on a third of the caterpillar’s size and, when the butterfly emerges, you can see that the clear shell next to the dried off butterfly is tiny.  It is perplexing to see and believe that it all fits and works so well.  I usually stay away from the word perfect, but this word is exactly the right description for how well a butterfly is formed and emerges from the shell of the cocoon.  Perfectly.

Two last details to mention: I never knew that the tail end of the caterpillar does not go into the cocoon.  It remains outside and becomes a dark shell of itself.  Also, when the butterfly is emerged at first, the body is quite caterpillar like.  As the wings unfold and dry off, so does the body, undulating and shrinking, while an orangish liquid drips out over the course of an hour & 1/2 to 2 hours.

It has taken a while to compile this response to my last post of whether the first butterfly my daughter and I had ever kept, would be able to emerge from the cocoon without problems.   The concern I had was because the caterpillar had formed the cocoon onto the side of the glass jar rather than to a twig or leaf, as we were completely new to the whole experience.

This first caterpillar formed the cocoon on July 2nd and emerged two days after we returned from vacation in California– July 12th. She emerged safely:

But as her wings unfolded and she tried to dry off, she couldn’t manage properly against the glass:

I put my hand inside and she began climbing onto my hand, up my arm and eventually rested, hanging at my chest, my heart center.  I didn’t know that I was in for a two hour meditation with this butterfly at my heart.  But that is what happened.  That morning I learned about the depth and wisdom of patience and waiting.  To sit in the sun with this new butterfly, was a discipline and joy I am grateful for.

When she was ready to leave, she flew to my hand and rested for a moment and then fluttered away to the highest tree top.  It was a little bewildering after all that time, to see her go and not know anything of where she was or what was in store.  That loss was quickly filled with gratitude and many lessons still burgeoning inside of me.

The second caterpillar was one that we found while we were keeping the first one.  We had brought the first one in on milkweed that had flower buds on it that she was eating.  Looking closely for ants and other bugs, I saw a speck of dirt moving on one of the flower buds.  Looking much closer, I saw that it was a tiny, tiny caterpillar who must have just emerged from the egg.  When we left for vacation I trusted that the little one would have plenty to eat too.  When we returned, she had gone from a speck to a couple inches long.  In another week, she was full grown and ready to begin the cocoon.  The following video captures her journey, not as a speck, but from the time she was full grown, with footage of her emerging as a butterfly and ending with her last seconds on my daughter’s hand before flying off into the sky.  See that footage here:

A few days later, my daughter and I saw two monarch butterflies dancing together in the air over the milkweed where we had found the two.  We would never know for sure, but we wanted to believe that was our two, dancing together over the site of their previous births.  We both smiled with joy and knowing from the heart.

I Am this, and You are too:

I am so hungry, I cannot stop searching

for nourishment.

I feed and feed and feed.  There is no end it seems.

And then,

I am full and ready and restless.

I feel as though I am turning inside out.

Diminishment….

Where am I going?

I act without planning, I become….nothing.

Tho something is stirring within me, deeply.

I must be alone now, shut away and in darkness.

………

Dying.

I disappear,

here is nothing left of me, who I was…

I am a puddle of who I used to be…

and still…..

powerful shifts shifting in me, and

what is this ‘me’?

how could there be?………

outwardly now,

my shell is so beautiful…fueling the changes..

Inside my mush is aligning wisely, forming into substance.

I am becoming.

I am becoming.

I feel myself more alive again, and I am

I am

myself.

And I am different.  I am ready

for a new life!

This is new life.

I am breaking through my old shell.

It is thin and transparent- finally,

and finally, I break through-

I am ready.

I taste the air, I tremble,

I move the newness of me around,

tasting, trembling, shifting,

I must wait now

a little longer,

Something great is happening now, to me,

I know

what to do

I am being

I AM

Being

I align with the stillness that birthed me

I shift with the light that warms me,

that fuels my being.

I wait.

I am the waiting.

I am new.  Again.  Now.

My wings tell me, ‘It is time.’

I lift up into the dream my mother

placed in me long ago,

in another lifetime.

I rise up and taste the nectar of my first flower,

the taste is a part of me, like bone and sinew of animals.

I follow the patterns of light and vibration and

I am

I am

I am

-Chandra Sherin

August 2009