wanderer || doreen gen tang

You know, I've always admired birds. Birds are just so beautiful, don't you think? They're so tiny and limited in their physical traits when you first look at them, but then they spread their wings and can go anywhere they please. The wind carries them across the airy currents of the world, letting them fly above the sycamore trees and the deep seas and the static embers of wildfires. They soar through the sky, slicing open clouds with their sharp feathery suspenders and making them spill their tears upon the thirsty world below. Their childish playing in the early morning dew induces their own laughter, the light chirping bubbling into a crescendo like tiny musicians with their myriad of harmonious voices. Beady eyes take in everything in a whirl of a kaleidoscope cacophony, their little heads swiveling to absorb everything in sight. It seems as if there is never a dull moment for the life of a bird. They live in a world of vision and color and beauty, far above where any man could reach with his own two hands. How I wish I could join them...

When I was little, everyone used to call me 'little birdy'. I used to sit in my backyard for hours in our old knobby tree, perched high in the branches and whistling at the birds that flew past me. The only problem was that I wasn't so very good at climbing. To be honest, I was horrid at it. I always came inside with cuts from the rough bark and a smarting head from smacking it against the branches. The angry red patches of skin clashed horribly with my pale white complexion, especially on my face. My mother would fuss for hours over me afterwards, combing my fine white-blonde hair until it was silky and untangled again. I would lay in a daze in her arms as she combed through it, rubbing over my sore scalp with her gentle hands, trying to make me forget every little hurt I'd ever experienced as she whispered to me about the dangers of taking a chance, of trying to fly. But you see, I'd never really thought of trying to take off on my own before. It had never been even an inkling in my mind, but the moment mother said it, it was like an infectious disease. I wanted to fly.

I wanted to be a bird so badly. My scrawny little girl body wanted to fly. I was overtaken by the thought, my sea green eyes constantly fixed to the sky and trying to reflect it's beauty. I would sit for hours up in those trees, the branches supporting my tiny bit of weight as I examined just how a bird took off, spread it's wings, and flew. For months, I just watched with that voice telling me over and over to fly. Finally, I did what any little girl would do to fly: jump. My frail body didn't quite enjoy that experiment when it came time to land, but for a split second, I was flying with the birds. For just one moment in time, I was soaring above the world with the wind swirling around my skinny body and lifting me up. Landing, however, was a completely different feeling. I wasn't used to my wings and I crashed, my body bent at awkward angles and my head smarting against the dirt. A firestorm of pain surged through me, my entire body screaming in protest until finally, it all went black.

By the time I woke up, it was two weeks later and half of my body was covered with sterile white bandages and casts. Everything was white hot pain, the culmination of it exploding behind my eyes and forcing me to bit down on my plump split lip. I screamed until my throat was hoarse and I could only moan beseechingly at the doctors who spoke in hushed voices in what sounded to my defecting ear like a different language. My moans sounded like the whale songs that I'd in recordings, the deep drawn out noise giving way to a high pitched keen until my voice cracked and was silenced by overuse. The voices drew nearer and nearer until they were murmuring right beside me, hands holding me tight as liquid flowed down through a small tube and into my veins, lighting me on fire for just a moment before everything was blank once more.

I don't know how long I was in that hospital, swimming in and out of consciousness day by day. What I do know is that I didn't know a thing. I couldn't remember anything from before my fly. My name was missing from my lips and my thoughts were missing from my head and my family was missing from my heart. I was as blank as could be, clueless about the world around me like a baby. I couldn't even talk. I screamed though. I was good at that. The doctors didn't know what do to with me except sedate me. I slept for a long time, my dreams filled with visions of flying through the air, free of the confinements of the ground and obligations of life. I soared for days in wakefulness as well, my body so filled with pain-killers that I could hardly look straight. I cried endlessly while a strange woman sobbed and held my head, stroking my fine hair with her fingers and begging me to return to her. All I could do to comfort her was smile dreamily through my drug induced haze and mumble made up words with my dried out lips.

Bits and pieces came back to me as the months went by, my ability to speak slowly returning and growing through the nurturing of the nice woman- my mother- and as the days continued to pass, I slowly remembered it all. I remembered my dreams of flying and my wishes to escape the grounded world. However, I couldn't remember what I'd been told five minutes prior to eating dinner or what mommy told me to practice the day before or the name of the boy that I'd just met or that I'd even met him in the first place. When I finally returned to school, the kids took to calling me 'bird brain' when I'd pass or when I'd answer a question in class. Even the teachers laughed at it, thinking it was little more than a pet name. The ironic thing was that it was true; I was a bird brain. There was little else in my head than the dream of flying and senseless fluffy feathers. I couldn't remember things mere minutes after I heard them as they got lost within the feathers inside my head.

My mother and father were worried beyond reason. I couldn't pass classes in school with such a useless brain inside my tiny head, so instead of continuing on with the fruitless venture that was school, I dropped out. There wasn't much else I really could do with my lack of memory. My mother tried hard to help me find a job at my tender age of twelve, but no one would take 'the stupid girl who could hardly even remember how to tie her shoes.' After months of searching, still no one would help us. Without any other options, I started to work for my mother. Now you see, mother was gifted. She had the hands of an angel, people said. That's why her dress shop was known as "Angels' Wings". She'd toil for days over a single wedding gown, sewing delicate pearls into the veil and crocheting delicate lace for the bodice and hemming the flowing skirt until it was finished and incomparable in beauty. Brides gained their wings within her shop, twirling and twirling until they sprouted and the angels cried with absolute joy.

Mother knew I couldn't be trusted with too much work. I'd just forget it within a few minutes anyway. She gave me the simple jobs; stringing pearls together for a necklace, fetching rolls of fabric from the back room, putting finished dresses on the racks. I worked for years at the simple jobs, my head constantly buzzing with the need to move and do something else until it would give up and I'd reboot, forgetting why exactly I had little white balls in my hands and why I was putting them on string. I'd wander off and find mother, only to have her shoo me back to my place to resume my work. I knew it was killing her to have to treat me so, but I was a bird. I needed to be shooed away from where I didn't belong. One day however, I forgot where it was that I did belong and kept on walking.

It was the middle of summer when I was eighteen when I finally sprouted my real wings and flew away into the dawn of a new life. The mantra of 'fly, fly, fly' had been repeating my head for as long as I could remember (which isn't saying much, trust me) and I simply couldn't take the stagnant replay of my life day by day. My mind, what little of it there was left, wanted out. It wanted to take off into the world and fend for itself with what little instinct it had left. It wanted to look a the world with beady eyes and take in the beauty that existed beyond the four walls of a tired home. I myself, wanted freedom and vision and a chance to reinvent myself in the rich diversity of the world around me, away from the influence of others that filled my head with nonsense only to have it emptied out minutes later. I was tired of being the stupid little girl just because I couldn't remember things. Not being able to remember things doesn't make you stupid. It simply makes you different from all of the other conformists out there. It simply made me unique. I had to keep on flying in my own direction, just keep flying until I couldn't seem to find my way back or comprehend where I was. There's something I remembered just fine.

Walking around our area of District Four wasn't very difficult, despite the memory loss aspect that kind of muddled up the streets in my head and turned me around until I reached the shore and had to spin back around. The streets were all labeled, which was nice and helpful for my sorry head, and I could remember the name of my own street. Most of the time, all I had to do was ask someone to help me home. Simple. Other times, I would sit down by the ocean for hours waiting for someone, anyone, to find me and take me home. Those days were my lowest, when I lost the will to fly and just wanted to drown instead, throw myself into the waves and let it wash me away with the evening tides. Sometimes, I thought it wouldn't be too bad to be a fish and swim out to sea before diving under and let myself be enveloped in the waves of the turquoise water at sunset, the beams of orange slipping inside the cool aquatic landscaping and setting it alight. Swimming was just flying in water, right? I didn't test the theory. I didn't want another 'accident.'

One day, walking home just didn't seem like something I wanted to do. I didn't feel like day-dreaming about wading into the water and drifting off to sea either. Instead, I just walked. I walked until my feet ached as if I'd broken the arches, as if I'd slammed them in a door multiple times. I didn't stop until it was well after nightfall, well after I was supposed to be home, and well gone from town. The grass was cool and soft under my sore feet as I walked along the boundary of the district, breathing in deep and absorbing the dark song of the blackbirds within the trees just beyond the fence. The forest beyond was dark and cold looking, sinister and filled with tiny eyes watching my every move from behind thick branches and rotund bushes. There was a mysterious cloak surrounding the trees just beyond my reach, just beyond a fence to keep me from every solving what puzzled me most.

I don't remember how long I laid there, my gold-spun hair splayed against the grass, my thin frame soaking in the night air, and my voice calling out in a swan song to the stars that twinkled brightly above me. I also don't remember when I was suddenly no longer alone, but surrounded by several men, all dressed in dark greens and earthy browns and lit only by a single torch. My throat didn't even let me scream as they were suddenly surrounding me, talking in hushed whispers and quiet murmurs about'what we should do with the little bird, we can't just let her be lost, let's help the little lady on her way.' I stood up unsurely, my slender body hidden behind the folds of a sundress and a sweater. One of them took my hand gently in his before smiling with pearl-white teeth, his eyes shining with genuine curiosity.

'Well, little bird, would you like to come with us?'

Within moments, my wings were released and I was flying through the forest at top speed, running to keep up with the men-(when had I met them and why were we running through a forest)- who had taken me from my nest, swept away my sadness, and given me the ability to soar. We traveled for days, the men guiding me back again and again as I walked off, unsure of where I was and who they were and what we were doing. They did all of the work while I just sat there and watched as they found food and cooked it over small fires, as they made small shelters out of fallen branches and leave during the rainy time, and hid us beneath bushes as large hovers passed overhead. They were my saviors, dangerous and gentle all at once. They seemed to know all, to see all. I guess they weren't though, cause they let me out of their sight and never got me back.

The road back is the one that is the hardest to find. It is the road least taken. It means defeat and surrender, the end of a journey that all was risked on and during which all was changed. I have changed. For me, there is no turning back, no matter how much I wish I could clip my wings and return to the arms of my parents, return to those who helped to raise me from the dirt when I had failed to fly. My wings are tired and I wish more than anything to have a home to return to. I can't seem to remember my way back. The path as been covered in failure and fallen trees, guarding the hope of a return to life as a person wishing to be a bird, and sealing me into the life of a bird with broken wings, unable to lift herself off the ground. If I could only just remember.

You know, I've always admired birds...