Cloud Watching

         The coccoon was soft but firm. It was a little sticky, and not really that easy to emerge from. After a few minutes, however, she just pushed and pushed with all her might, and the wrapping finally broke open. She crawled through the small crack, stretched her wings, and took a quick look at her surroundings.
         Yes, she thought to herself, everything was the same. The forest to the east and south. The plains to the north and the west. And there on the western horizon were the snow capped mountains; the earthen peaks that felt the passage of the moving clouds. How she longed to see those peaks; to fly among those clouds.
         Soon, she said to herself, I will make my way to those mountains; but first I must become strong. I must become strong enough to make the journey to those mountains.
         So the little butterfly ate and fed and became strong. And one morning she left her tree; left the shelter of her birthplace. She crawled up the trunk, and then out to the edge of one of the high limbs. When the wind felt right, she cast off, and began her long journey across the plain.
         Much of her journey was tedious. She spent many hours fighting the roiling winds, and often entertained the idea of settling down with many of the butterfly communities that she passed along the way.
         But the mountains were always there in her sight. They were always there in her mind. She wanted to get to these mountains; fly to the top. Even more than that, she wanted to see what was beyond the mountains. So she kept flying; she flew and flew and flew, until one day she came upon the base of one of the mountains. So enourmous it seemed to her miniscule body. So huge and impossible. But she had come all this way. She couldn't stop now. She wouldn't stop now. She gazed up at the mountain, tensed her wings, and began the last flight she would ever take. On and on she flew; at first straight up, but then in a zig-zag pattern as the effort became greater and greater.
         She flew and flew and flew up the side of this great mountain. She was a butterfly trying to reach the pinnacle of Heaven. She was a sinner without sorrow trying to find her salvation. Higher and higher she flew; colder and colder it became. Her zig-zagging pattern soon became erratic; she began to falter and lose strength. Her wings became stiff; her breath became ragged. The thin, frigid air was taking its toll on the young butterfly.
         Finally , When at last her wings gave out, she pulled her body up the steep slope with the three legs that still worked. She looked up as she crawled, and could just make out the peak above. Just a little further, she thought, just a little further.
         She crawled relentlessly through the powder and ice; over the rocks and the cold earth. She crawled and her heart became sad; an emptiness filled her as she began to realize that her broken body might not carry her to the top, and that she would perish whether she made it or not.
         Even with this realization, however, she would not give up. There was still a chance. With a little determination, she eventually pulled herself through the layer of clouds, and from then on her eyes never left the top of the mountain. She dragged herself a few more feet, tried to flutter her wings, and then stopped. Her body would go no further. Her legs were frozen; her wings, with that last desperate flutter, had broken off. Her goal, only meters away, was now unreachable.
         An overwhelming sadness engulfed her. She would die as she was, and would never know the mystery beyond the mountain. In a few minutes she didn't even feel the cold. Her breathing became hard, labored, and then it stopped alltogether. Her last breath was pushed out of her body.
         This final breath, this last vestige of the butterfly's existence, paused and hovered for a moment above the frozen body. Then slowly, almost deliberately, it descended into the clouds below.

         In a village at the base of the mountain, it was the children that noticed it first. The adults, at first interpreting the children's gleeful yells as imaginary exaggeration, noticed it soon after. In short order, the entire village was standing on the common lawn with their heads tilted upward toward the sky. Gliding slowly, high above the mountain, was a white cloud in the perfect shape of a butterfly.