Guy Carter - Virginia Lake at Midnight

A calm tree full of butterfly leaves
Pale, flittery wings in the light:
neon sunshine, the white from beneath.
Ethereal glow of fantasies awoken,
a children’s book of night time delight.
Shadows crash-land from awkward angles
Unnatural shapes distorting the view-
lighthouse tower, beacon for little darlings of the dark.

Kaleidoscope animals, realized in shaky relief
as butterflies turn into flowers.
The watchers of this midnight pantomime look on,
all gaping mouths and bent-back necks-
feet like tree’s roots, steadfast in mud,
unrecognized and overlooked for the above.
We look at the stars, find butterflies and
flowers, but forget the foundation beneath.

Guy Carter

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/virginia-lake-at-midnight/