Trevor Burrows"The Painted Lady" by Margaret Danner
The Painted Lady is a small African
Butterfly gayly toned deep tan and peach
That seems as tremulous and delicately sheer
As the objects I treasure, yet this cosmopolitan
Can cross the sea at the icy time of the year
In the trail of the big boats, to France.
Mischance is as wide and grey as the lake here
In Chicago. Is there strength enough in my
Peach paper rose or lavender sea-laced fan?
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Read it, along with Danner's "Best Loved of Africa," here: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/browse?contentId=27120
The Painted Lady by Margaret Danner | Best Loved of… | Poetry Magazine
October 1956 | Richard Ashman, Margaret Danner, Harold Fleming, Arthur Gregor, Howard Moss, Leonard Nathan, Kenneth Patchen, Kenneth Rexroth, Harry Roskolenko, K. Taylor, Theodore Weiss, Frederick Bock, Reuel Denney, Frederick Eckman, Edwin Honig