it was so much easier when I could still
imagine myself a bird, untethered
and free to take flight on a whim.

In dreams I often flew, no Icarus
but a raptor, peering down, seeing
with a clarity the earth denied me.

Now my roots have taken hold
in the enmeshing soil plunged deep
and spread tendrils anchoring me,

and even thought of flight has been
buried deeply in memory, and I am
like others of my species, left

to maneuver through my life knowing
that true freedom is waiting, but
above and always now out of reach.