The Feather

A rickety, ramshackle abode
Broken windows, bats in the loft
Dusty old spiders webs
Hang like spectres
And an old, now silent grandfather clock
Where time had passed it by
The floorboards creaked
As mice scuttled along
Holes in the roof
Had let the elements in
Recent rainfall
At least
Had washed away
Some of the dust
Yet deep down
An old corridor
Where walls hung empty
A small glow of light
Leaked out
From beneath a door
And the faint sound
Of scratching could be heard
As an old quill
Connected with a yellowing vellum
Words were born
Thrown together
As old India ink
were leaked onto empty pages
Drip drops created small puddles
As if drunken spiders
Had staggered across the pages
There were two sources of light
Within this dusty old chamber
One came from an oil lamp
The other
From glowing coals within the hearth
An icy chill wind
Suddenly swept through the broken leaking windows
Somehow snuffing out
The lamplight
Just at the time
The heart of the old writer
Beat it's last beat
This author of words
Would write no more
The quill
Somehow, and strangely
Carried on writing
Dipping itself
Into the India ink
Somehow empowered
With a curious magic
Its only memories
Had been of flight
And this is what it wrote of
The memories, flooding back
Of soaring skywards
With its host
And the thrill
And wonder
Of floating on the breezes
Feeling the warm currents
Caress its softness
This mother host
Also died
The feather fell free
Then floated along the soft grass
Of a dewy meadow
Was scooped up
By its current host
And taken to its current abode
Where it's tips, were carved into shape
As it was then fed with ink
As it was guided onto the soft white vellum
At first
It had no idea
That these patterns being formed
Were words
But soon
Began to understand
And learn
And feel the thrill
As the writer wrote
With the same excitement
As a bird in flight
Their heartbeats
Not disimilar
The quill
Began to write
With a mind of its own
Of the land, the sea, the sky
And as it wrote
The emotions, and feelings
Of its two hosts
Rippled through its feathered body
As it began to appreciate
The beauty of the seasons
And the music
Of birdsong
And the magic
Of mother nature
And for the first time
It cried
Soft gentle joyous tears
That fell softly
Like a trickling stream
Watering down the India ink
That in turn
Fell onto the soft, now yellowed
And aged vellum
And were soaked up
Into the poetry
Of life
The ink, one day
Dried up
And the feathered quill
Fell into a deep sleep
A peaceful calm repose
As it lay down
Next to the words
Of its life
Now as quiet
As an unwound clock

by Jemia