How Does It Feel To Fly?

Sun through clouds, photo by Rachel B. Baxter

I had a dream that a great brown bird,
like an eagle or an overgrown mourning dove,
flew above our neighborhood in long sweeping ovals
as a homing pigeon does.
“How does it feel,” I asked him, “to fly?”
He said nothing, only landed softly upon the grass
and covered my children and I with his great wings.
I closed my eyes and imagined all the things I might do,
if only I could fly.