Sitting in a corner,
My wings still rest beside me.
The gate stands open—
I just don't remember
how to fly.
I used to chase the breeze
And loved to hum every rhyme
I remember every wild ride
The storms that broke my stride
Nonetheless,I got up again for a new flight
The bruises on my wings are far less,
And my own mind
Still pecks at every feather.
The dark horizon is gathering shadows
The dark horizon is gathering shadows.
All the vanishing wings,
And here I am—
Marooned away
Will I learn to fly one day,
Or stay caged away?
She dreamt of being a fairy,
yet she was unaware that reality would be cruel and scary.
When she stands for herself and raises her voice,
it becomes nothing but an unheard noise.
If she dares to raise an objection,
it is labelled as a disrespectful action.
She is forced to speak softly,
yet ends up losing her voice silently.
Are her dreams the problem,
or the boundaries she is forced to live in?
Everyday I live, I am a prisoner
There is freedom but I am caged
There is happiness but I am sad
heavily my heart bleeds for nothing
Not able to place my fingers on what is bleeding my heart
Or should I say I lack of self continuity
Written By: D. Collins 7/7/25
I know the names of some of the greatest to ever dawn black skin.
Dr. Charles Drew, Miles Davis, Malcolm X, and James Baldwin.
Generations from now their achievements will be overlooked.
Due to coordinated efforts to remove them from history books.
There were the Buffalo Soldiers and Tuskegee Airmen.
Maya Angelou and descriptive writings of Toni Morrison.
We had Dr. Martin Luther King and Muhammad Ali.
Who gave hope to a population of people like me.
We've endured the longest deprivation mankind has faced.
You cannot remove something that refuses to be erased.
We've heard broken promises that never came about.
The Caged Bird Still Sings loudly from the top of the mount.
They locked her in a box of gold,
with chains that shimmered, stories told.
"Stay pretty, still–don't ask for more,
The fire in you? Just folklore".
she smiled like myths were make–believe,
But hid a flame beneath her sleeve.
each breath she took was kindling slow,
A furnace marked in ash and glow.
The saw her feathers, red and bright,
But clipped her wings do dim her light.
"You burn too loud", they used to say,
"And blaze is not the woman way".
Yet silence cracks, and embers bite –
she burst the cage in blaze and flight.
Not tamed, not torn, not anyone’s—
she rose to kiss forbidden suns.
Now when they speak her name in fear,
It echoes loud and crystal clear:
You cannot cage what’s born to rise
A phoenix lives in ashes's guise
~hira~
clouds alight
dew beads on wet leaves
feels like love...
sleeping buds
blossom their unfolded wings
a caged skylark trills.
Nine years and a half, a love story spun,
Or so I believed, beneath the rising sun.
I gave my heart, my trust, my very soul,
But found myself within a deepening hole.
A gilded cage, you fashioned it with care,
Bars of obligation, whispers of despair.
My wings were clipped, my spirit held so tight,
Dimming my sunshine, stealing all my light.
The walls grew higher, day by weary day,
As freedom's song began to fade away.
And then the cracks, the tremors of the ground,
Your choices echoed, a devastating sound.
The cage you built, not only held me fast,
But wounded children, shadows from the past.
A web of pain, spun out for all to see,
And suddenly, the truth was clear to me.
No longer bound by promises betrayed,
No longer silenced, no longer afraid.
With steady hands, and purpose in my stride,
I took the power back, I looked inside.
The architect of freedom,
I became,
Erasing lines, dismantling all the blame.
The cage is gone, the blueprint ripped apart,
A new beginning, a brand-new work of art.
I swallowed words like razors in the dark,
A thousand cuts across my broken skin,
They told me "silence"—so I hid the spark,
While screaming softly, bleeding deep within.
The mirror lied: it whispered I was whole,
But fractures ran beneath the painted face.
I smiled and nodded, playing the doomed role,
While scars—my silent hymns—betrayed my grace.
They told me love was safe, but it was fire,
A flame that licked and burned my fragile core.
I danced on glass, mistaking wounds for choir,
And sang my pain to walls that asked for more.
Now I refuse the comfort of the lie,
For silence kills, but screaming helps me fly.
earth life tests again and again
ego identification cause of pain
whenever our guard drops, we suffer
soul as yet wears delusion’s chain
my soul is like a c a g ed animal yearning to break free....
Embedded in the snare of self-sacrifice
twisting and snarling only able to bleed.
As the years pass me by,
I've remained stuck in a cage.
Built up by my fears,
made strong by my rage.
I sometimes get to wander free in a garden filled with color.
A blissful peace within myself, forgotten moments after it's discovered.
Retreating back to the comforts of my cage.
A confinement of my mind, body, and soul.
i have lived in houses
that kept me,
but never held me.
i was a guest in my own life—
told to give,
but never to take.
told to understand,
but never to be understood.
told to forgive,
but never to ask why.
they built my life like a cage
and called it safety.
locked the doors
and named it protection.
when their choices
crushed my ribs,
they asked why i could not breathe.
one day,
i will build a home
where my dreams do not knock
before entering.
where i do not have to carve myself smaller
to fit inside.
one day,
i will belong
to no one but myself.
We started off with being/
A human stuck in a tiny box/
Like a caged animal/
Day by day, we lose our senses/
To be poked and prodded/
Day and night for amusement/
This is a game to them/
Looking into the cage/
To rile the beast within/
The expected become unexpected/
The situation becomes dire/
Crying in desperation/
Remember, it's a human being/
Locked away in isolation/
Treated like garbage/
No Gods hears the cries/
From within the walls/
Trapped like a caged animal/
ONE Only New Years Goal for 2025 Poetry Contest
Constance La France
As we springboard into another year, I want to dive in, make a big splash, and come to the surface with a big smile on my face. For me, this will be a first ... if I can submit for a whole year. I want to lose the albatross around my waist. In preceding years I had that ugly bird caged for the first three weeks and then he escaped. For three weeks everything is tailored. I'm counting calories, running, and doing yoga. Everything is in check. The jaybird in me is singing, especially when I see the mirror. Then like Connie's work or clockwork, I fall to the chagrin of that ugly bird. Every year I'm a three-week whirlwind then become a drift. I drift off. Some crises, dramas, or love stories take center stage, and I lose focus. I fall. The curtains are then drawn. And I recoil back into my unhealthy ways, like a lollipop. And the feather one is laughing. Can I gather the willpower this time and surprise that ugly bird?
big bird go away
please stop clinging on to me
it doesn't look nice
Rust clings like memories,
framing the world,
a mottled lace of time—
the window pane,
a portal to whispers,
yet the view is
a watercolor dream,
blurring edges,
softening the harshness,
where light dances
through corroded veins,
and beauty hides
in the flawed
and the forgotten.
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