Butterflies of Golden Rivers

It happened while meditating. Nothing at first. Passing thoughts of my day flowing through my mind like the soft ease of the wind through sunbeams; work, friends, money, my mother...she came then. As I thought of my mother this goddess appeared, she was beautiful risen from a river of what was surely pure gold. She was a butterfly. Or maybe an angel, something with wings, as they were whites the cleanest white nearly too pure for visible appreciation. As when I felt my mind begin to wonder about who she was or what she was it all got black, folded into itself closed like the lotus at dusk. I stopped. No more questions. So. Hmm. I focused back on my breathing and what felt like years later flecks of her river began to flow back through my conscious. She smiled and wrapped up into herself, daring not to reveal her full magnificence, and she moved that way. I had a sense that if she opened I would be in fixed awe of her. Was she my mother? I studied her, I knew her. She was a savior...not of humanity. Not even of one in particular, but that's what she would her wings for. I never asked but I knew. Her twisted course mane and wide smile cloaked in white with sunshine at her belly. Golden like the river of her birth. Golden goddess.

How do I know her? I watched her float, and laugh, and move within her river of wealth and abundance. She never knew a day without riches and yet had no use for it, she craved the air and laughed just to feel it across her lips. Wait.

Isn't fly my favorite word? Isn't white my color, with a golden core...at my belly? Is she me? I had barely asked the question to no one, and simultaneously the universe at large when I felt hot streams of salt escape my eyes. I opened them, shocked at their wetness, surprised at the audacity of my spirit. She was beautiful, I thought, as if she and I were any different. I hugged myself secretly wishing for the warmth of silken wings laced in pure. And I whispered to her, we have to fly.