I’ll Fly Away

Alas, oh land of whirring wings
Which lies beyond the rivers of Cush… Isaiah 18: 1

over the face of the waters,
a hovering not yet named
imagined into
a sudden notion of feathers 
and then the translucent sapphire sky thickens into a joyous flapping
streaming colors, shapes dipping and curving:
the great eagles, the tiny wren, and a great array of everything in between 
to each of these given
a way to defy gravity
to lift off or to soften a landing
to hide their kill from competitors
a covering for their young
a way to soar higher than the eye can see
which, in the case of humans, is exactly 
what Adam and Eve did, even as the creator himself
was delighting in his feathery imaginings.
They fashioned their own set of wings, flew right of the garden, 
and left all creatures pretty flighty, prone to crash landings, forever 
cruising the creeks in search of home.
The young osprey tumble from their nest into waves of air 
and cry out for the pleasure of soaring (so soon to be a troubling necessity).
The double belted kingfisher streaks from one 
piling to the next, can’t stay put for long;
his hunger propels him headlong into the creek, he’s his own harpoon; 
the pelican’s death defying catapult stuns his prey. Their wings will bear them up 
to the next violence. There is a humming
in the beating wings that forever cries lost, lost.  Here I cannot stay,
squawks the great blue heron from shade of the live oak. What is it calling me?
The ibis drift in their companies from one spot to the next, dripping 
and slinging mud from their frantic foragings.
Though a sweet breeze wanders over the marsh
and the creek is steady and true
the view, short or long, quivers the wings.
Who can say whether wings are a curse or a blessing?  God only knows.
A little wren flies through the open door of my screen porch
makes the dog frantic with its fluttering. In order to rescue the bird  I must terrify it,
capture it in my hand, feel it cling and then collapse, it is so slight
in my palm, a tiny ruffle of feathers, motionless as though expired 
from fright, or resigned to the error of its ways, or perhaps it thinks 
it has found its heart’s true home. I stand in the open door. 
And then, a stirring, as it remembers its wings.