When I was a child we lived in a house with many landings

On each of these landings there were many prints of exotic birds

I often visited these birds willing them to fly

But they never did remaining still in their frames

My father was a monumental mason who often gave me offcuts of his work

I collected angels and hoshana’s infants and the stars

Yet everything remained still

It was not until a wine merchant died that I was able to free all the birds

My father gave me a bunch of marble grapes which I showed to the parrots and the parakeets the hummingbirds and the tars

And slowly these birds emerged from their entrapment and began to fly around the many landings of my house

The collected angels illuminated this precious adventure and the infant children held my hands as we watched these creatures leave through the many windows opened