Baby

[pjthompson]

Hot off the presses, and prompted (as many things are) by a conversation with asakiyume and with bogwitch64.

Baby

What dreams does the captive bird know?
Is it of flying in vast, swooping clouds
of bird bodies, or soaring solo through forests,
playing the leaves like xylophone keys,
singing along with the notes?

Does she know she is a bird, or does
captivity define her as human-not-human?
Does she squander her days playing
with the baubles provided by her keepers,
or do they bring her real joy, a settled peace?

Or a peace with a ribbon of black threaded
through the chattering whiteness of her hours,
a ribbon that ruffles with the slightest breeze,
pulling, tugging, longing to burst all the doors,
break through the windows, touch the blue-grey sky,
and once and for all sail away on the wind?

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.