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A Fly Taught Me to Fly
It came like a whisper
on wings too dirty for angels,
a fly with no gospel—
just bloodlust and fire.
I don’t remember the bite—
only the stories they told me—
the brain-boil, the silence
of a body already leaving,
the baby too lethargic
to be called alive,
and the ice-water baths.
Above the crib, they hovered—
not angels, not flies,
but entities without names,
bodiless heads darkling the air
and gazing at me
through fever, muscle and bone
like they were trying
to decide if I’d stay.
They didn’t speak.
They didn’t need to.
Then light fractured like crystal—
a thousand shards of purple fire
and malachite rain
and respiring walls.
My hands were wings,
or roots, or stars.
Sound became color,
and color became taste—
I drank something blue
and forgot my name.
I didn’t return unchanged.
I still taste color in silence,
but boundaries are smudged
between thought and sky,
betwixt dream and doorframe,
and now I write letters
from the borderlands
because a fly taught me to fly,
and every shadow since
has hidden wings.
Copyright ©
Roxanne Andorfer
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