My nay-sayers and my neighbors all told me,
“You cannot live this dream. Fish may not fly.”
“You will burn; just punishment for trying to fly too close to the sun.”
But I answered, “I am the caged bird who sets herself free.”
And I said, “I am bound to ride West, to seek my fortune in the desert dark and muddy muck of mind that is the place all art begins.”
Limp sadness or a perfect anger, I rage away on the page and I am healed, I am saved, Born anew like a caterpillar, crawling into chrysalis darkness,
who emerges to test new-gilded wings in the summer air.
That bright moment will come.
You will soar.