Dark Bird
Why do we reduce reality to one octave,
to simplify, to survive?
The magnum opus hums just beyond reach
of the dark bird’s wingbeat, a secret fracturing the air.
The universe sings in undertones,
notes lost in the stillness of craving
yet we long for ____
something small enough to hold,
to press against our soul
when the silence grows too loud.
But the poet knows ____
truth lives in the marrow of darkness,
in the animal lust of want.
To write is to descend,
to press a hand to the pulse of shadow,
where hunger is raw and unspoken.
Underneath, desire is an echo,
a body remembering itself,
flesh yearning for the myth of touch,
primal, unfiltered,
like the first fire licking the cave walls,
like the stillness before a name is given.
We forget the wind carries secrets,
that roots hum beneath the soil,
that light itself is a chorus
spilling gold into morning.
But we choose the known,
a scale we can master,
a pattern we can repeat,
fearing the infinite song
that might undo us.
And yet,
in the pause between heartbeats,
in the quiet before ____ the dark bird sings,
in the spaces where the music falters,
something lingers,
an undertone,
a world ____
waiting.
© Gesso Cocteau
