A Colorful Metamorphosis – A Riddle

---

When I am born in a small egg

I have neither head nor have I leg.

All I am once I am hatched

is an eating machine well matched.

**

All I’m then is stomach and mouth

I’m eating through meals from North through South.

growing, growing is my goal

I’m a worm with no heart, nor have I soul.

**

But even then I’m out of norm

I have different colors, skin or form.

I come in all different, wormy sorts

just eating to us, is life and sports.

**

After I have reached my size

the next stage of life, it is my prize.

A time of silence it is, and peace

a time to change and still to cease.

**

For quite some time I am a shell

‘pupa’ called, it’s hidden well.

Every cell of mine is turning me

into something else, you soon will see.

**

The last and most important stage

is of an adult, out of that cage.

A second time it’s time to hatch

my former ‘me’s’ well to dispatch.

**

This time, no doubt, I first will be

a trembling ‘newborn’, delicate and free.

This time I’m beautiful with wings to fly.

I figure you guessed – now I am a butterfly.

*****

(Copyright: Aurora Jean Alexander, August 2018)

Picture courtesy of: http://www.spiritanimal.info/butterfly-spirit-animal/