To Live, Flightless Birds
A single branch, clawed and pecked, fickle and straining,
Lonely Nestling and father, paw and peck at their home
Lonely branch, spasms in the wind
Nestling and father paw and peck, yearn and whimper
These Flightless Birds, on a fickle branch
Young nestling skitters to the branch’s edge
Peers over on to sightless depths
Shivers, ruffles withered feathers
Spreads tousled wings
And loosens fast aging down
Stretches till overgrown talons graze the edge
Like endless days before, Craning aching neck
Eyes devouring the scene with a famished hunger-
And whimpers
Turns to father and warbles in longing,
A sight that speaks of flight
Dreams of swimming amidst the clouds
To leave
-slightest breeze carries words...
to live
The father, neck cramped, tilted, eyes swivelling to and fro
Cooing and cawing, talons pawing
A slight breeze, decrepit feathers hauled away in swarms
A forlorn sight that reeks of abandoned dreams
Warbling, cooing and cawing, pleading and pawing
Pecking in apprehension, neck swivelling to and fro in exasperation
“To leave father! To stretch my wings
Lift from them the smell of rot and loss
To fly father”
“To fall! To fall, and to die!”
-Wind whispers,
To fall, to soar, and to live
Nestling shuffles to the edge,
Settles down amidst aching joints and a teetering ledge
Peers down onto sightless depths
-they bellow to him
To fall, to fly, to Die!
Fall and flutter amidst a shower of feathers
Cramping wings crooked and futile
To swirl into freedom carried by the stench of inevitability
To fall, to fly, to die
Little Nestling whimpers, nothing so glorious about death
nothing so glorious without flight...
Whimpers, shuffles forward, talons pricking oblivion
Ruffles feathers, settles down
Nestling wavers, branch bending
Rotting down tickles his beak, claws dig deeper into branch
Eyes feasting on sightless depths
Endless fears...
They scream to him
To sit, to dream to fly...
To sit, to dream of revitalized wings
Stretching across the sky, an unveiling of freedom
The shattering of chains every morning, with a stretch of wings
The exercise of freedom
to sit and dream
to live
to sit at the edge of that tottering branch
creaking and bending under a restless and aging body
peering over into the sky, where fickle wings will not go
and with dreams, with dreams lift off this branch
and fly, where body cannot
and live
Copyright © Samir Georges | Year Posted 2010
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