The Cold Owl Poem by Connor Anderson

Cold, yielding, yet wishes to be undaunted, from the sorrow laden
that he forfeits. Ruthlessly he cries, flightless
he tries, but still is sitting, never flitting.
From that hunched shadow with the thousand yard stare that lies before him. No word spoken here, and not a single token from the moon are bequeathed to the owl.

The light o’er him blinds him and the wind does not
howl for him; for this lament is of whim, from a time much brighter on the other side of the moon. A time where the cold did not reach the old, and the roots dug deeper than those caverns of old, where gold was found and stories thereafter were told.

Oh, that poor cold owl, perched upon his throne of frost. I wish I knew the time you did too. Where twilight and song lingered through and through. I, too, was scarcely sure I could touch and dream
it in harmony. But it is not that poor, withered, cold owl’s fault he does not carry a rainbow upon his flightless wings. But it is in his nature to dream of higher altitudes than that shadowy engulfed sky of rime. Away from the place where hell and laughter goes.

But… maybe that poor, cold, withered owl was not to blame. For the world cannot help agreeing he should not bore anger from his imagination; nor should he not want it. Instead, maybe it is just a curse, one that we all live with, from birth ‘till death. And we must endure with it.

Then maybe, just maybe… we are all a part of that wingless, crestfallen owl. And we are one and all of its feathers that it flutters so that one day, we might just reach higher than Atlas and live in that world we dreamed of everyday.

That dreamed up world that never was.

From that dreamed up cold owl that could never be.