The Solitary Vireo Poem by Tristian Ford

The Vireo moves merrily before the gentle gale;
He is loosed from his moorings and free.
I Am a man fast in invisible shackles,
Whose capital flight was suspended by decree.
A substantial human being
A substantial feathered friend
A substantial body of evidence to the contrary
We are both solitary creatures
The Vireo flies zestfully
upborne, airborne, overborne,
A Terra-forborne soaring Suborner
I stand willingly
earthborn, earthbound, earthnuts,
An Earthworm emerging Earthling.

A Solitary Vireo
Freedom's swift-winged angel
That flys around the world;
I Am confined in bands of iron
A wingless patron
That walks around shackled and whirled.

Solitary Vireo
O, that I were free!
That I were on your gallant gray-white greenish wings
A vivid dream breeze
rather than
This fierce stern reality



O, My feathered friend
Betwixt you and I are the howling winds!
So when you see God again
Ask Him,
'If I Am who He shall send,
To tell the modern-day pharaoh,
To let All Of His People Go? '

O, that I were free!
If I could fly like
A Solitary Vireo
O, that I could also go-to yestermorrow
If I could fly like
A Solitary Vireo

As the Vireo hides in the dim distance,
I watch,
Left exposed in the hottest hell
To a relentless iron hand.
A hand that only becomes cold as iron
As it binds the people heavy burdens
Too grievous to be borne,
and place them on the shoulders of many women and many more men,
And even the shoulders of little children.

I Am born a boy-Will I die like an animal?
What kind of brutes have the bureaucrats formed in
This land?
Those brutes themselves never move those burdens
With one single finger from one single hand.

I was born a boy
Here I stand-I Am Another Man!
Will I die like an animal,
In solitary confinement?
I have faith that this is just a pit
Of refinement.

So a caged jailbird sings.
'The boy cringed away as well as his fears'
'A Man arises from the ashes'
Defying gravity
A Defiant Hero
As is above-As is below
A Caged Bird
A Solitary Vireo

Tristian L.F. Ford