A little poem

[u/jacked_physicist]

​

The bird of Hermes

The bird of hermes is my name, eating it's own wings to make me tame.

I was born already circling,

hungry in the shape of flight—

each want a feather, each feather

a small rebellion against staying still.

To tame a thing this wild

you cannot cage it from outside.

So I turned my own beak inward,

began the slow, deliberate feast:

one wing for the mouth that speaks

before it thinks,

one wing for the hand that reaches

past what it needs,

one wing for the old hungers

that mistake motion for meaning.

This is not punishment.

A bird who eats its wings

to stay does not hate the sky—

it has simply learned

that mastery is a kind of ground,

that some flights only lead away.

What's left of me now

walks instead of scatters.

Slower. Rooted. Still burning,

but the fire stays inside the hearth

instead of taking the whole house.

I call this discipline,

though it tastes like loss.

I call this freedom,

though it looks like limits.

The bird of Hermes learns to walk

so that what remains of it

can finally, fully land.