What Bella Learned

So that is how Bella learned the garden's quiet secret.

A caterpillar does not vanish when it makes its green chrysalis — it rests inside while its body slowly changes. Day by day, in a way you cannot rush, it turns into a butterfly.

And when it finally comes out, with wings that open wide in the sun, it can fly — anywhere it likes: over the roses, past the sunflowers, across the whole wide garden and beyond.

It sips sweet nectar from the flowers and, as it flits from bloom to bloom, it helps the plants too. One small life on one leaf can become something that dances in the air.

Bella looked at the milkweed and smiled. She would never again think a missing caterpillar was only gone.

It might be on its way to the sky.