We have children grown now, with children of their own.
We have had joy together many years now, he and I.
I remember now that day’s late sunlight, slanting between leaves,
The strange beauty that pierced us, our joy in a minor key,
Until suddenly the castle walls loomed from the weird shadows
And the owl came circling three times with its nightfall wings.

As my soft voice became song, and my body wings,
My mind, too, shifted, slipped away, no longer my own.
My self was lost in the song, feathered in shadows,
And all I knew became the nightingale. I
Beat against the cage, as she carried me from my key—
His heart—left locked behind us among the darkening leaves.

Then I remembered neither speech nor hands, neither sky nor leaves,
Only wings in a wicker cage, which are no wings.
And in my nightingale mind only one fragile key
With which to keep locked the center of my own
Identity: the certainty that I could sing, that I
With song could claim space against shackles and shadows.

Seven thousand cages hung in a great hall hung with shadows,
Seven thousand birds losing selves as their memories leave.
Once woman, now bird, and all I remembered was that I
Must cling to the wild knowledge of outstretched wings,
And sing to my sisters until their songs joined my own.
All I knew was that somewhere in our chorus was a key.

Later I learned to remember the long days when he and I,
Both imprisoned in despair, both sought for some precious key
Of freedom from the witch’s power. I beat my wings
And sang; he sought answers in his dreams’ dark shadows
And found the red flower, pearl at its heart, that relieves
All curses. I fostered a flock, while he searched on his own.

Later I learned how the spell of the dew-pearled key,
Brought him unsnared through the castle’s deep shadows.
All doors sprang open, but he had no guide of his own
Through the maze of hallways and darkness he could not leave.
It was birdsong that led him to me, and beating of wings,
And my flock calling out when the witch concealed me. I,

I was in the dark then, but I remember now how penned wings
Shed at the touch of that key, and my mind was again my own.
I remember, and I believe that song threads a path through the shadows.