Fingers Freezing to My Keys on Evergreen

I like to spend nights like these thinking of myself as a bird

I am a girl who is a bird who is a girl who is & so on & so on & such

Flitting from every party, the girl-bird thinks not what she has done wrong

Nor where she’d rather be

She flies in the direction the wind pulls

Or, suppose I’m not much of a girl-bird

Maybe not much of a bird at all

Birds tend to fly free

They leave when they want

& right now I am more of a girl who is following the crowd

I go where my friend’s point

Thinking not of where I’d like to be nor who these boys are

Not slipping into the backdrop & wondering how many hours left until I am back in my bed & my shower & my cozy, little life

Not a girl-bird

Not very free

Maybe I am more of the bark in the bird’s tree

The splinters in the hands below

The shyest girl in class

& the only sentence my girl-bird voice could muster this entire afternoon–turned evening–turned day was a simple:

No no, not me.

I’m the wrong Alex.

I think you wanted him.

See, not really a girl-bird

Not a girl with direction

Not a girl with flight