Help
Sign In
butterfly
September 2009 
The Path of an Insect
Posted on Dec 27th, 2006
by 
Donan
Donan
It begins life as an egg, deposited alone and abandoned. It emerges, to fend for itself. It begins feeding, growing…it is largely defenseless and is easily crushed under foot or swallowed by those who would devour it for their own pleasure. Some are lost. Thickened layers of skin restrict its growth and are discarded. It crawls to a safe place. It has had enough and its last skin is traded for a hard protective shell. It can seem dead to the casual observer. Then a miracle of rebirth, metamorphosis in this armored blackened skin and shed, beauty takes to sky--but not without effort. It must fight its way else it will emerge deformed and never will fly. So, are we. The philosopher king is wrought through trial and pain, of modes morose, and spirit regained.
FarrelEaves
Access: PublicTagged with: Philosopher, king, enlightenment, butterfly, meditation, deformed, layers, self, Plato, metamorphosis, death, rebirth, Farrell Eaves
I realize that it's nothing new to relate butterflies to the transformation of soul–but some days it is well worth doing.
With obsolete layers of protection removed, what remains is a beautiful thing…and because of the process emerges a strong soaring thing that others, with their defective layers of pseudo-self well intact and disfunctioning loudly, cannot reach to disfigure.
Farrell Eaves is a good friend and an amazing person with a philosophy of hope and transformation. You can see more of his breathtaking work at FarrellEaves.com and please contact me if you would like signed giclee prints. Of course his work is copyrighted so please respect that :-)
I was going to say something cheeky, like “philosopher queens too, baby!” But after I read your comment, I realized that archetypal symbols are (of course) rediscovered over and over again, and that, in itself, is a process worth noting and celebrating! As a child, I used to capture Monoarch cocoons in mayonaise jars and watch them emerge later. My mother and I would watch together, making sure that the insect could fly away free when it was ready to go. I would also go out and fill jars with grasshoppers for my brother. He’s 15 years older than I, and he liked to fish. I would prove my devotion to him by presenting him with jar after jar crammed with the unlucky bugs. There were locusts, too–light green, and often several inches in length. These were all fish food–jammed together and doomed for sure. Speciesism! :)
The philosopher king is a reference to plato's republic where he suggested sheltering future leaders from anything suggestive of other than the good. Often the most beautiful leaders have known great suffering?
My father was born in the Congo and lived there until he was a teenager…i too occasionally caught doomed grasshoppers as a child…but the food chain was a little more direct.
Donan, I loved your retelling of the metamorphosis. As I was reading your story it made me think that ideas themselves seem to follow a similar path. And you are right, the telling is always important. When I was a teenager I caught a Cecropia(sp?) moth in my baseball hat at a carnival. It was night time and this huge beautiful moth, as big as a hand, flew into a light pole and fluttered to the ground. I took it home and put it under a coffee can in the grass. In the morning my younger brother and I went outside and lifted the can. We were stunned to see not one but three of these beautiful creatures under the can. It was a mind stop. Later I determined that the two new ones were males. Pheremones and the moonlight had carried these two to this place and they were not to be deterred by a can in the grass.
Hi Ron, That's a great way to catch a moth. If I recall correctly, the Cecropia only lives for a few weeks in the adult stage and for only one purpose, something obviously not lost on the two males who found their way into the can. You may have made the next generation possible by saving the one from the entrapment of the false light. I wonder what Plato would make of that? D.
Donan, I guess we never know where the mother is going to turn up. I didn't know that about Cecropia's window of time for regeneration. Isn't it strange how as we move down the stairway from animal to insect, birth and death appear to draw closer and closer together in time.Or is it merely relative to our view of time relative to animals and insects? (Salmon spawning, Charlotte, the spider laying her eggs and then expiring) The amount of force required to sustain life is directly approaching the amount required to create life? Help me out here Donan. Does this make any sense at all?Just an arm chair entemologist . What would Plato think. There just isn't enough gossip available regarding Plato. Could he have been a field biologist? Maybe we can imply certain similarities in behavior/personality traits attributable to philosopher's and biologists in general Patience-check. Quietude-check. Observation and deductive skills-check. Ron
I have no idea if Plato thought much on bugs…i imagine that he pondered everything…I do know that he considered entrapment of false light. As far as life cycles, i think there is generally enough time for comfort–but with enough exceptions requiring great precision (e.g. salmon) to make things interesting. I also think that an empiricist cannot help but be both philosopher and scientist.