We are ghosts that cast shadows
flying through your thoughts like birds:
one minute there, the next gone.
We are the birds, the absent,
and it is bad luck to mention us.
We may take wing, stop lingering and leave,
may not return, may fade away
like fog under the burning sun.

But fly to us, come to us and you will see,
we are humans with body and voice,
with eyes that see and hearts that yearn.
We shed our feathers and weave stories with them,
give them away
give them all away.
You too will know what it is to fly.

But tiredly you flag,
the wind sags beneath your wings.
You drop to the earth,
feathers falling all around you,
and we become the birds once again
fading into the morning mist
that hovers on the horizon.