I love butterflies. They are, of course, beautiful and important in the natural world but they are also an amazing, some would say overused, metaphorical wonder! Part of their magic and mystery (and metaphor!) stems from their remarkable metamorphosis that sees them turn to goo inside the chrysalis. This happens when dormant cells, called imaginal cells begin a process of creating a new form and structure. The Imaginal Labs writes: “At first these imaginal cells – the seeds of future potential, which contain the blueprint of a flying creature—operate independently as single-cell organisms. They are regarded as threats and are attacked by the caterpillar’s immune system. But they persist, multiply, and connect with each other. The imaginal cells form clusters and clumps, begin resonating at the same frequency and passing information back and forth until they hit a tipping point. They begin acting not as discrete individual cells but as a multi-cell organism – and a butterfly is born.”
Future potential. They persist. They form clusters. They connect with each other. They pass information back and forth. Imaginal cells are the ultimate revolutionary: they hold the possibility of a future vision. I love that.
But.
There’s a “before” and an “after” and then there is “during.” That painful time when it’s only goo and the new possibilities are seen as threats. No one talks about that part of the transformation.
Since October 7th, I have thought about this journey of transformation a lot: There was definitely a “before” but “after” is a long way away and we, the giant messy “We” of humanity are in the dissolution stage. The ways that the world is currently viewing Jews and the narrative of the world’s view of the war is on ever shifting, terrifying quick sand. Who or how we will be “after” has not emerged.
We are creating it as we dissolve. In whatever way each of us is going through this, we will all come out changed in some way. Are already changed and changing. More fear, more rage, more sorrow, more tribal, less tribal, turning more towards, turning completely away.
But back to butterflies and transformation. I am a visual artist and my art journal went through its own transformation during Covid. My art became larger, fluid, less attached to the days or weeks and became meditations of time falling apart, of getting stuck or lost in time. Now it is a war journal and the art is filled with despair, images of hope overlaid upon images from war and prayers for peace. My art helps me process being in the goo of change and despair.
In the chaos of covid, during which my beloved mother was killed in a car accident, and now with the chaos of the war, I get through the goo in the same way: an intense focus on the smallest changes in the natural world. I watch the small blossoms unfold, the miniscule day to day differences in the seedling, the dandelion giving way to puffball. Focusing deeply on the small changes in my local environment is a way for me to cope with the horrors of the wider world.
In March the barred owls were looking for mates and the mornings and evenings were filled with their haunting and humorous “Who cooks for you?” calls. For about two weeks I waited to hear them; somehow, their presence assured me that everything was OK. I intently watched the daffodils give way to azaleas, to irises, to snowball bushes and the trees shake off their pollen and into their summer glory.
Some days I lay on the floor and cry. Some days I hide my head under the covers. Some nights I lie wakeful, watching out the dark window, afraid to sleep. My Jewish world is in disarray; my progressive world is in disarray. Former alliances are broken and still unhealed. I rage against the binary, the insistence that there is one right side when there are no right sides and and only an expanse of pain too deep and wide to comprehend.
We are all in the goo right now.
How do we use our imaginal cells to craft a new response and contribute to a larger transformation?
I despair in feeling that we have turned from our deepest teachings and are becoming unrecognizable. How can we deploy the wisdom of machloket l’shem shamayim – arguments for the sake of heaven – to remember that our world is a holy community. How can we build upon p’kuah nefesh (to save a life) and b’tzelem Elohim (made in the image of God) to remember that we are all related?
How can we get the men in power to put down their guns?
How can we plant trees for the future that our descendants will sit under in peace?
How do we heal?
How do we turn towards each other?
While I believe that the answer is always love, my despair and my cynicism rise up and shatter my hope. My poor battered hope, constantly under siege. And so the only thing I can do after the letters, the donations, the weeping and the hugging is to focus once again on the emerging seedling. Listen for the barred owl. Watch the rains clear away the yellow haze of pollen. I pray that it will sweep away the red haze of war along with it.
I pray that we will use the “during” of this terrible transformation to imagine something different. I pray that we will use this dissolution to emerge stronger and more beautiful. I pray that together we can make the great migration to peace. We don’t know what it will look like but if we can use our imaginal cells, I know we can find a new way through.
Lo-nayda mah-na’avod et-Yah ad-bo’aynu shama
We don’t know how we will serve YHVH until we get there. (Exodus 10:26)