Free Will
A sniper’s bullet
is guided by a perfect aim
as it closes in on a life,
just as I near those many lives
I will quell.
I was once cold, tired, wet
and always hungry
very hungry.
My brains were in my eyes,
my eyes were my trigger,
and I was free.
These days I am pampered in a prison.
I could choose to keep flying,
to never return,
to fly at will again.
But I don’t.
Perched on the edge of new understanding,
I now kill on command
then wait for meat to be placed at my feet.
My drive has been redirected,
not diminished.
My life has been altered,
not made worse.
I am but the bullet,
no longer the sniper.
Another week, another poem; I am on a roll thanks to The Ink Well Community and this week's poetry challenge! I can't thank @raj808 enough for getting poetic blood pumping through my heart again.
So what to write for the prompt "freedom"? After a day of pondering this, I realized it was a perfect prompt for continuing a prior poem which I recently published to steem entitled Raptor. I hope you will go read that collection of four very short poems that precede and inform this one. I wrote those about ten years ago, thinking I would surely be back to finish them someday. Looks like today is that day. I would be honored if you would read them all.
I had to do quite a bit of research for this, just as I did hours and hours of research for each of the previous four. After watching a bunch of videos on falconry, I've chosen Understanding Falconry to include with this post. I highly recommend that you watch this video. Jemima Parry-Jones is both brilliant at falconry, and very funny!
Big News!
Introducing my very first published recording of myself. I channeled Janis Joplin to record this - this is my one and only take. My gratitude to @raj808 for helping me figure out how to get my voice onto Steem. It's a new era!
Thank you so very much for supporting my work here.
image source
Awesome poem. Freedom is paramont to our existence and to cryptocurrency.
Welcome to Hive! Following to build real community.
Thank you! I have high hopes for the Hive. Steem had gotten ugly.
Hi @owasco!
Do you hear a buzz :))
I'm not ready to post yet. Still a little disoriented. But soon.
Good to see you here.
Disoriented is an understatement! I have very little idea what is going on. First I have to choose a platform, then I have to choose a community, then I have to wonder if I've done either of them right. Blech. But nice to see you here too, and I hope this is a kinder place than steem has been the last couple months.
Beautiful poem and reading, @owasco! You have a rich reading voice. Nicely done! I am going to have to figure out video and recordings one of these days! Maybe I will follow your lead and get it done now that it’s a new era, as you say!
Thank you - @raj808 helped me. I could send the instructions to you I think. It involved down loadin an app on my phone and then signing up for soundcloud. Would you please do me a favor and tell me if you see this post on my Hive blog twice? I just reposted it on Hive (originally reposted it on steempeak) because it was getting no attention after Hive went live.
You did it!
The poem is here twice: Ink Well and your own blog. And what a poem!
This is so powerful and poignant. I am the bullet - goosebumps!
I can say nothing more eloquent than "Wow. I love this."
Thank you! I'm so happy to have added one more piece to that poem. I need one segment about the bird's training. I skipped that part.
Wow... Beautiful piece of writing. I like the depth of the metaphors. That living being that seems to crawl towards degeneration, loss of faculties or change of circumstances; it is old age with its wisdom that has crawled like a snake, invading spaces previously full of passion and adrenaline, transforming the intrepid hunter of yesteryear, who where he put his eyes, put his bullet, into a calm and meek bird.
A prison built by force of habit and a friendly comfort zone is what has gradually conquered the brave hunter of other times.
However, this transformation is not synonymous with weakness, but with understanding the journey. It is no longer the wild flight that attracts, but the soft plane, the enjoyment of the landscape, the freedom to choose to stay if you like or take flight if you want.
Excellent interpretation of my words! Thank you for taking the time to read it so closely and give it thought.
Yes!!
I think I got that, too, without having read the brilliant way @zeleiracordero articulates this, but even if I do understand/comprehend a poem, I seem unable to explain it the way Zeleira just did. What a great response to a great poem. :)
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