Thoughts from a Thinking Girl

It is always a sin to reach too high.
 

For Icarus,
the urge to defy his father
to prove something
to someone
flapping sun-ward on waxen wings
and hubris
falling sea-ward.
Bravado, burnt or iced,
can’t keep us
from drowning.

 
I feel for Icarus.
 

We share the fate
of father’s imprisoned in their own Labyrinth
of being told
to follow someone else’s air stream
in the path that might work for them
safely above the sea
safely below the sun
of the urge to defy sound advice
ecstasy and joy lofting us higher and higher
the feel of our wings providing power
never felt on Earth’s surface,
the penalty box for mortals.

 
When my wings melted
I, too, fell.

 
And though our Fathers were freed to fly
we grounded them again
to live out the sentence
we imposed.

 
All a broken-hearted Father can do
is name the spot
where death seals over
the child who aimed too high.