originally posted on cohost (rip)

we didn’t always used to have wings.

they wrote poetry and music and stories about them, back in the day. all possessed by this deep ingrained longing. you see, they knew what they were owed. they didn’t know how to find it, that they were allowed to have it, but they needed it. it was an inevitable thing, that we became creatures of flight. it’s who we were from the very beginning.

you know me, i love to travel. lots of things in life are like flight. watching the sunset, eating a hot meal, embracing a loved one. some things never bore you.

but in my spare time, i find myself poring over old texts. literature, news articles, scientific papers, photographs. photos of the old and wingless. i look, expecting to feel strange about them, but all i feel is familiarity. somewhere in my bones is the dna of the wingless. sometimes, when i look over them long enough, i forget that i can fly.

then i feel the longing, too.

isn’t it strange? to long for what you already have. i think… i became attracted to it, that flavor of melancholy, and now i’ve felt it so much that i hold it with me even as i fly.