Mary’s Lament

A butterfly pinned into place.

Mary felt like a butterfly specimen, pinned into place and kept under glass to be regarded by future specialists who would discuss her attributes even after she was dead and dried up. She may have once been beautiful and carefree, but then, in one moment—that exact moment when she was nailed to the felt board—she became forever stuck—forbidden to move forward, incapable of going back.

Jakob kept her affixed in the same spot and cemented to guilt she did not claim. She hadn’t done anything wrong. She loved him, the man who swept her off her feet. She married him, and she bore his children. Why did he treat her as his enemy? Why did he always blame her for his unhappiness? She was his beautiful, dead butterfly, stuck in time and space.

Will I ever feel free?

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3 thoughts on “Mary’s Lament

  1. Annie Chmielewski

    Another powerful entry…I envision the butterfly captured within the collector’s net…the moment of paralysis where life as it was known is gone. Sunshine, flowers, freedom just a memory. Your writing evokes a picture in such a beautiful way.

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