Butterfly

She's almost always there.

sitting crosslegged on the sidewalk

with the purple blooms of agapanthus

nodding in the breeze over her head.

Eating pancakes.

She asked me for a smoke.

Told me her name

-Butterfly.

says that she is an African warrior queen.

Her outstretched hand is crusted with dirt,

because it seems the last bath she had

is a question for her royal history.

A big half-dressed, barefoot African warrior queen

with missing teeth and a missing mind

but the sweetness of a child.

I walk past her spot on the sidewalk

by the park-with-no-name

every afternoon. So I give her

a dollar or two sometimes a five,

whatever I have in my pocket.

She likes cigarettes too,

says -I love smoke. and laughs her big

four-front-teeth-missing smile.

so I tuck a smoke into whatever

folded dollars I give her.

Today I told her I was

going to be gone for a month

and gave her a five.

She says

-I know what peoples had to do.

Says it like the punchline of a joke

that only she understands.

I hope she makes it 'til I come back.

Because you know, even to

simple-minded African warrior queens,

crusted with filth and kind of crazy,

who sleep in the dirt under the poplars

in the park adjacent to the office towers …

Because things happen.

and five weeks from now,

I might not see her.

Eating her cheap pancakes,

and asking me for a Camel

or a Coke with lots of ice.

I said Goodbye Butterfly,

see you when I get back.

and walked on to catch my bus.

Things happened.