Wingspan

We wondered yesterday,
just for fun
what kind of birds we would be –
parrots, bright and chattering,
swans, graceful, white and vehicular, as is
the owl, but wiser looking and patiently intent,
as we perhaps sometimes can be, or freewheeling slightly crazed
bluejays, going whee over children’s heads,
all of their continual pastime music
that leads to the windows opening out to maybe the park
you once visited as a child hanging onto your mother’s index finger
breathing in the autumnal sunshine, for you had to wait until the rains had passed
to leave everything shinier, greener, and until the birds came back to fly.
And maybe we are creatures of flight inside, and in the night when nobody’s looking, and you know that beyond the fan whirring against the ceiling lies your unlived life,
we could take off solitary
And measure ourselves stretched out against the cool hippie skies
singing ourselves hoarse, wingtip to wingtip.