Johnny Can't Fly

 By Lexi

Biting through his encasement,

The clipped-winged man is weeping.

Desperate for flight,

To be removed from your wings and confined

Is not innate but merely fateful;

If you are a free-flying bird in Florida

Owner comes out to play,

Holding his endless cigarette.

He can't seem to grasp the bird

Who is refusing,

Who is biting and scratching at his encasement.

Owner explains, through thick and cloudy exhales of smoke,

He doesn't want to play today.

(He shit himself.)

Trying to break free, biting and scratching towards no end only to reach 

The fishing line,

The unbreakable string that once bound my necklace,

Which had been so carefully owened,

Only to fall apart the next morning.

The freedom appeared to be misplaced, the bird's bite strong yet not quite in the right spot.

The cage is locked the next morning,

Same as any other.

The same morning that the beads of my necklace fell to the floor.

Perhaps the bead got lost in the tumult of it all,

And stayed with the bird, enveloped in its fierce grasp.

Biting through his encasement has instilled a muscle memory,

The very one that tore through the unbreakable fishing line.

The very one that tore through the unbreakable fishing line.

For my broken necklace, thank you, birdy,

For a beacon of freedom,

A piece of the key that unlocks the cage

If only he could fly right out,

Break away from the cigarette smoke blowing into his barren cell.

Fly right out, only further this time,

Further than his clipped wings could ever allow for.