His Wings By Kelsea Bittner

The Singing By C.K. Williams

I was walking home down a hill near our house 
on a balmy afternoon
under the blossoms
Of the pear trees that go flamboyantly mad here 
every spring with
their burgeoning forth

When a young man turned in from a corner singing 
no it was more of
a cadenced shouting
Most of which I couldn't catch I thought because 
the young man was
black speaking black

It didn't matter I could tell he was making his 
song up which pleased 
me he was nice-looking
Husky dressed in some style of big pants obviously 
full of himself
hence his lyrical flowing over

We went along in the same direction then he noticed 
me there almost
beside him and "Big"
He shouted-sang "Big" and I thought how droll 
to have my height
incorporated in his song

So I smiled but the face of the young man showed nothing 
he looked
in fact pointedly away
And his song changed "I'm not a nice person"
he chanted "I'm not
I'm not a nice person"

No menace was meant I gathered no particular threat
but he did want
to be certain I knew
That if my smile implied I conceived of anything like concord
between us I should forget it

That's all nothing else happened his song became 
indecipherable to
me again he arrived
Where he was going a house where a girl in braids 
waited for him on
the porch that was all

No one saw no one heard all the unasked and 
unanswered questions
were left where they were
It occurred to me to sing back "I'm not a nice 
person either" but I
couldn't come up with a tune

Besides I wouldn't have meant it nor he have believed 
it both of us
knew just where we were
In the duet we composed the equation we made 
the conventions to
which we were condemned

Sometimes it feels even when no one is there that 
someone something
is watching and listening
Someone to rectify redo remake this time again though 
no one saw nor
heard no one was there


_________________________________________________________________________________
His Wings

On this day I witnessed a miracle

Walking over a bridge only to see,

A child to my left, noticing me

This figure, I notice, building away

Gathering sticks and rocks and string to use

I had no idea what he was building

And he had lost his interest in me

I stood there waiting to see the product

Wondering whom this child belonged to?

His body, covered in dirt and shoeless

His eyes, consumed by pain and loneliness

I glanced left and right and found no one else

Working, building, he forgot about me

Standing there, pondering his existence

His project was beginning to take shape

It appeared as if he was making wings

Struggling a bit, I offered my hand

Refusing my help, he muttered through it

I thought to say, everyone needs help

But there on that bridge, I had no worries

I had no problems, help I did not need

The child assumed this and let me be

Wings almost complete, my eyes at the ground

No sounds to be heard, no one to be seen

Suddenly, the child and his wings, gone

Out of sight and leaving behind no trace

Only I had witnessed this miracle

But where did he go, and how did he leave?

With no one to see, who would believe me?

I saw, I felt, I heard, that is enough