Molt

Did your wings get heavy with the rain?
Did you toss the morning dew back to the air?
When did it start to burn?

Though the morning sunrise curled your hair,
The silence of two thousand sunsets left you
Sheared
Shivering
Until you couldn’t stand to hug yourself anymore.

Your rags are little more than a veil,
Yet they chewed through the fiber of your skin
Biting
Binding
Until you became inseparable.

At some point you have to realize what’s going on.
Is it slow? Do you even have time to look down and stop yourse—
Calm down


and breathe.

Feel the future pelt your neck.
Feel the present fill your lungs.
Feel the past ride up your throat.

Take one last step into the edgeless expanse.
And fly.
Even though you can’t feel it.

Listen.
Listen to your wings quiver in the storm.