The Fledgling - A Poem

 

THE FLEDGLING

The fledgling was born, but it was not nurtured or loved or allowed to gently find its own path. It was controlled, smothered, spied on, made to feel useless, stupid, ugly, untrustworthy, a disappointment. Is it no wonder it took to a quiet corner of the nest, hiding there, keeping its precious dreams under wing, lest they be ridiculed for the sheer audacity of their beauty.

Dreams of flights to colorful other-worlds where fledglings bloomed like flowers in the sun and rain, kissed by a breeze of hope and joy, blessed by the utter brilliance of knowing, just knowing, what belonging meant. The fledgling lingered in that quiet corner, the dreams swept away by the fluttering of hard, cruel wings. It became accustomed to the stench of rotten straw and broken branches, lived there, joyless, never singing; no past to console it, no future to redeem it, existing solely for the sake of not dying.

When the wind finally takes the nest, what will remain? Bones, feathers, the glint of an eye that never really learned to see, the hint of a voice that could have lightened the troubles of the whole world with a single song, had it been given the chance, the right all fledglings have, to try.