take flight

The bird flew overhead.

Its wings turned in the air and gathered the wind,

a dart of black smudge against brilliant blue.

It traced a faint cloud and

tore downward into the tree line,

vanishing as quickly as it came.

And then back over the treetops

as it soared into the sky.

Second coming

of grace in air.

It tempted the breeze,

turning tight and lingering

as if it weren’t moving at all.

Then it was gone below the pines

and the moment was lost as if it had

never occurred.

The trail ahead was tight.

Nothing left to chance,

no way to detour,

or turn back into the brilliance that was left behind.

Ahead,

the sun and

the flight of a bird both vanished and dreary in

the escaping memory of what it was,

or had been.

And the sounds came from all around.

The forest buzzed with life

and insects scooped at the air,

unaware of their nature.

Tufts of cloud, here and there,

dotted with life

so was life in that moment;

life for life’s sake.

And the air was sweet,

The taste was pine and lake and river

winding through it all,

nothing left but the air and the taste and the growing need to move on through it all in sweat and soil and gracious,

pulling need.

In that moment came a thought of tranquility and loss as if some great tear had opened up

in the fabric of consciousness,

washed out in the morning grey

that turned in on itself,

giving way to blue and violet and salmon.

The idea was clear and drifting of its own will

and nothing was left to chance

in that moment.

It was clear and defined as it was

elusive and coy.

Both wanting and feral,

not of this time,

but of another.

And so it was gone as quickly as it had come.

No real answers exist beyond

the taste and

the flight and

the air which brought it to unsuspecting souls,

out for a walk in the

morning mist,

all alone on that dreary day which gave light to

the sky and

the dreams are never as vivid as they are remembered when the blue washes out the clouds overhead.

A smudge of black against brilliant blue,

it all turns back on itself and the meaning is lost on the wind to unsuspecting eyes which see and

the sounds are lost too from ears that never heard and

the taste is still as sweet as it had ever been or ever will be from this day forward.

So the scope of imagination

is lost

in youth

if it is allowed to flee from hardened eyes.