A self-described fool holds a great purple butterfly in his hands and feels that it carries a kind of knowledge he cannot reach. There is a “learning in his eye” that belongs to something older and stranger than the fool’s own mind. He imagines the butterfly was once a severe schoolmaster, feared by his pupils, bearing a birch and a book. That former life taught it to hear experience as both sweet and harsh, like the clang of a bell, and so to take roses—beauty and pain together—as its food. The mood is mysterious, playful, and a little wistful: the fool marvels at a wisdom just beyond his grasp. The butterfly becomes a picture of a soul changed by harsh discipline into something delicate, vivid, and strangely free.
Another Song of a Fool — Summary
This great purple butterfly, In the prison of my hands, Has a learning in his eye Not a poor fool understands. Once he lived a schoolmaster With a stark, denying look, A string of scholars went in fear Of his great birch and his great book. Like the clangour of a bell, Sweet and harsh, harsh and sweet, That is how he learnt so well To take the roses for his meat.