four-chambered heart

for sunday scribbling: wingsI have said that she gives me wings.

I have said that, though I have been collecting feathers my entire life, downy and sweet, flight and contour and semiplume feathers, even occasional bristle feathers and filoplume feathers, it was her who gave me the map, the blueprint, for the abilities to soar, to take off and land, to catch a ray of wind and float.

I have said she takes me to such heights, takes me to the peaks of mountains, looking down over valleys where everything below is neat and organized, small, managable.

I could continue with the bird metaphors, hollow bones and unfolding; flying, nesting, cracking open; a four-chambered heart, ruby breasted; flocks and migration and hovering and perching.

But what I really want to say is that I was not raised to believe in pride. I don’t know what it’s like for others to take credit for my accomplishments, no matter how much my accomplishment was helped by your maps, your tender caresses, your careful slices of leather cut around the outlines of my feet for my landing.

This flight is my victory. And while you are calling to me from the clifftop, yelling claims to my own soaring moments, the air is so clear and still that all I can hear is the beating of my own wings.