Free Bird

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  “. . . A light broke in upon my brain,—  It was the carol of a bird;  It ceased, and then it came again,  The sweetest song ear ever heard,  And mine was thankful till my eyes  Ran over with the glad surprise,  And they that moment could not see  I was the mate of misery.  But then by dull degrees came back  My senses to their wonted track;  I saw the dungeon walls and floor  Close slowly round me as before,  I saw the glimmer of the sun  Creeping as it before had done,  But through the crevice where it came  That bird was perched, as fond and tame,  And tamer than upon the tree;  A lovely bird, with azure wings,  And song that said a thousand things,  And seemed to say them all for me!  I never saw its like before,  I ne’er shall see its likeness more;  It seemed like me to want a mate,  But was not half so desolate,  And it was come to love me when  None ...

Icarus Montgolfier Wright

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"And together in a single leap, swim, rush, flail, jump, sail and glide, upturned to sun, moon, stars, they would go above Atlantic, Mediterranean; over country, wilderness, city, town; in gaseous silence, riffling feather, rattle-drum fram, in volcanic eruption, in timid, sputtering roar; in start, jar, hesitation, then steady ascension, beautifully held, wonderously transported, they would laugh and cry each his own own name to himself. . . . Each feeling the bright feathers stir and bud deep-buried and thrusting to burst from their riven should-blades! Each leaving behind the echo of their flying, a sound to encircle, recircle the earth in the winds and speak again in other years to the sons of the sons of their sons, asleep but hearing the restless midnight sky."

Bradbury, Ray. "Icarus Montgolfier Wright." The Day it Rained Forever. Granda: London, 1977.

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