An open balcony,
vases, roses, a butterfly dancing.
All that.
Pristine skies over the balcony
and almond flowers on the streets.
The dervish still whirls
but quietly.
Semantics blurred in her mind;
she couldn’t distinguish
the butterfly’s dance
from the dervish’s whirls.
The butterfly tattoo on her arm exposed;
it’s time to take a selfie,
it’s time to take more selfies
before the butterfly vanishes
because in the company of butterflies
she feels more photogenic.
Ali Znaidi (b.1977) lives in Redeyef, Tunisia. He is the author of several chapbooks, including Experimental Ruminations (Fowlpox Press, 2012), Moon’s Cloth Embroidered with Poems (Origami Poems Project, 2012), Bye, Donna Summer! (Fowlpox Press, 2014), and Taste of the Edge (Kind of a Hurricane Press, 2014).
