Winged Words

Like a creature hibernating in its burrow Waiting to come out with the first verdure of spring The seed of a poem lay dormant in my heart Through the long winter awaiting another spring After staying torpid inside for long At a time I expected it the least Timidly came out the first word As shaky as a calf getting up for the first time Then another came and word after word in a row Like pellets of rain on the window pane I boiled them in the crucibles of my imagination And finally dipping them in the ocean of my emotions But rhyme came to set constraints For the right alignment I struggled I had to decide on its texture and format Pondered if it should be a sonnet or an ode I might have kept the door open for long Alas! All my words and fancies flew away Like birds taking on wings into the sky From a cage where they were imprisoned for long I stood so helpless with my mouth shut Staring blankly out into the airy nothing Like one lost in the doorway of his own threshold Unable to call back those winged words lost in the void