Mocking Birds
By Owen Wagg
Watching the birds
Outside my hospice room
In their full expression
Enjoying freedom’s flight,
They mock me here
Unable to ascertain now
Such a precious gift
Of life’s freedom.
Outside my hospice room
In their full expression
Enjoying freedom’s flight,
They mock me here
Unable to ascertain now
Such a precious gift
Of life’s freedom.
Lying age-bound
In my recumbent state,
I can only watch longingly
Their youthful vigor
That was once also mine,
Now draining away
Ever so slowly
Here in my confined bed.
In this empty shell
Am I─withering away.
Hoping, wishing
For better days
That will never come,
Lying here in my dying.
Once I cast aside
This mortal shell,
And take my first soul breath,
I’ll be free again to fly.
They’ll mock me no more
As I Mach past them
In my newly-winged flight.
Owen Wagg lives in Muskoka, Ontario, Canada where he writes in his spare time and drives a loader at a local stone quarry, giving him plenty of time to contemplate life and death, and the way of things. Being 67, it is very evident to Owen that every day is a gift before the end of this sojourn, and not just a “someday it will happen” thought that occurred in his youth. He has four self-published books and has won a runner-up poetry award in the United States as well as four runner- up poetry awards in Canada. He doesn’t fear death, since like all of life, things continually change, and he will just change into something different at his mortal end.