Feathers I would pick up off
the ground, usually plain dull gray
sometimes with a tinge of white – if you were lucky –
fallen from the sorts of birds you stop noticing
after a few years living in the city,
Pigeons and Seagulls, mostly, but I
would start to notice them, scattered
in the grass or hidden beneath a leaf,
and would carry home these lost relics with me.
At certain thrift shops I could find more exotic feathers –
downy things of softer brown were usually
all I could afford,
though I coveted the feathers of blue and green,
striking orange, never purple, sometimes red;
the chicken feathers were cheap, but the long striped ones
from their male counterparts, the roosters,
were twenty dollars each. These feathers hold beauty
and a secret that mankind
has long sought after, how these fragile
and soft things could propel a small bird
into the sky, escaping the ground -
oh, how we wish we could follow them -
and so I would collect these fallen pieces of the sky,
not necessarily hoping to fly, but
earnestly harvesting their unnoticed beauty,
remembering that each feather I wear in my hair has
been, up there, in the sky,
supporting a bird as it made its first leap into space,
as it flew in a flock over hundreds of miles
every year, to reach one hallowed spring
where they could find lovers and raise families,
building their own nests, and caring for the young,
with their downy feathers and bright yellow beaks
chirping incessantly for food, and soon
with fresh feathers and plenty of spirit,
out into space they would go, just as their parents had
years before – and I remember that each feather
has been through the universal task of flight
appointed to birds,
so that man can look up into the sky,
shielding the sun from his gaze,
and know there is still hope,
that he, too, can be free
that even though he doesn't possess the godly
gift of flight, the feathers,
something does, and he can watch them all day
if he likes,
and daydream of flying