Empty of their flight.

Poems.

Empty of their flight.

At dawn, the world awakens

to the first notes of birdsong,

a fragile hymn of wings

and morning light. The trees,

once silent sentinels, become

a chorus of feathers and breath,

each call a thread

in the tapestry of the sky.

There is a freedom in their flight,

a grace that defies gravity,

a reminder of the delicate balance

between earth and air,

the unseen currents

that guide them, unseen

yet felt in every beat

of their hollow bones.

The sparrow, the hawk, the unseen

warbler in the thicket—all are bound

by the same ancient rhythm,

the same pulse that quickens

with the rise of the sun,

that carries them over fields,

across rivers, to places

we can only dream of.

In their eyes, the reflection

of a world uncharted,

the unspoken promise

of distant shores, of lands

where the horizon bends

toward the unknown. Their song

is a map, a compass

for the soul, pointing always

toward the edge of what we know.

And in the evening,

as the light fades, they return

to roost, their voices

a lullaby, a gentle closing

of the day. The sky,

empty of their flight,

holds the memory of their passage,

a whispering trace of wings

in the twilight air.

We watch them, these small

messengers of the divine,

and wonder at their journeys,

the secrets they carry

in their hearts, the stories

they weave in the spaces

between our lives, a constant,

unseen thread that binds

us to the sky.

---

Tempered by the fire.

Failure arrives unbidden,

a shadow at the edge of light,

a whisper of doubt

in the clear voice of morning.

It sits heavy, a stone

in the heart, a weight

that pulls at the wings

of ambition, grounding

what once soared.

In the stillness, it speaks

of lessons learned, of roads

not taken, of doors closed

with a finality that echoes

through the corridors

of the mind. There is a silence

in its presence, a pause

before the next breath, the next step.

We wear our failures

like scars, invisible tattoos

etched deep into the skin,

a testament to our striving,

our reaching beyond

the safe and known.

Each misstep, each fall

is a chapter in the story

we tell ourselves, a footnote

in the narrative of becoming.

But there is a strength

in the breaking, a resilience

in the bending. The heart

that endures, that finds

its rhythm anew, is a heart

tempered by the fire

of its own making. Failure

is not the end, but a beginning,

a chance to remake, to reshape

the world in our own image.

In the darkness, there is light

waiting to be found, a glimmer

of hope in the ashes. The path

may be lost, but the journey

continues, the soul

relentless in its pursuit

of meaning, of redemption.

We rise from our failures,

changed, yes, but stronger,

with the wisdom of the fallen,

the knowledge that to fail

is to be human, to strive

in the face of uncertainty,

to dare the impossible

and find, in the attempt,

the true measure of our worth.

---

In the end.

In the thick of night, the stars

burn with a ferocity only he could see,

their light twisting through the darkness,

a dance of fire and eternity.

His eyes, wide with the hunger

of vision, capture the world

in swirls of color, in strokes

that pulse with the heartbeat

of the earth.

Alone in his room, the canvas

before him, he paints the fields

of his mind, the wheat bending

under the weight of the wind,

the cypress reaching skyward,

a flame against the blue,

each stroke a cry, a whisper

of the soul's turmoil, of its fierce,

unyielding desire to be known.

He lives in the margins,

a man apart, his mind

a labyrinth of light and shadow,

where the ordinary becomes

extraordinary, where the mundane

transcends its bounds.

The sunflowers, the irises,

the starry night—each a testament

to the beauty found

in the broken places, in the edges

of sanity and despair.

There is a madness in his genius,

a brilliance in his suffering,

the relentless drive to capture

what others overlook, to give form

to the unseen, the unheard.

His heart beats in every brushstroke,

a symphony of color

that speaks of love, of loss,

of the endless struggle

to find peace in the chaos.

In the end, the world

cannot contain him, cannot hold

the vast expanse of his vision.

He slips through its grasp,

leaving behind a legacy

of light, a testament

to the power of the human spirit,

to the art of seeing

with the heart, of finding beauty

in the depths of pain,

in the brilliance of a star-strewn night.