Differential Migration

The birds are returning with spring and you’re at the sill, yearning. You’ve got crumpled wings, too long asphyxiated during emergence. A prolonged delivery, the midwife had explained softly after you’d first fallen asleep. A complication in becoming. You’ve followed all the doctors’ recommendations since with diligence, the surgeries, PT, but it’s made no difference. Still, you cannot lift your wings. Still, they do not even straighten, forever rucked like sodden laundry. I keep expecting you to retreat from the window, but there you are every year—your own annual migration—watching the return of freedom life has denied you.