I wrote the poem 'Free Bird' because it carries a very personal experience with someone I deeply cared for. My poem is mostly about loving someone who kept me for a long time close enough to have hope, but never close enough to truly feel chosen. I also included lines to symbolize that there were moment that I (Dove) felt like there was something real between us... Whenever I finally tried to go, I was given enough hope to make me stay a little bit longer.
I chose to represent Dove as myself because in this instance the dove represents love, fidelity, purity and innocence. While I chose the guy that I finally left as Crow because a crow normally represents death, bad luck, and misfortune.
Dove represents the part of me that kept believing love could grow if I was patient enough, by giving up my happiness. While Crow represents someone who may have cared in his own way, but could never give me the certainty and love I was waiting for through out live. (on that wire) I kept starting
I kept turning small gestures into reasons to stay because admitting that they might mean nothing was more painful than holding onto the possibility that one day he would choose me.
The poem is also about how exhausting it becomes to love someone in uncertainty. Sometimes hope is not always beautiful but rather the thing that can keep you trapped. The ending represents something that I am still learning: leaving does not mean that the love was never real. Sometimes you can love a person deeply and still realize that staying is hurting you.
Dove flying away is not about suddenly forgetting Crow or becoming completely healed but rather it is about finally choosing herself... even while she is still bruised, hurt and tired. She leaves because she finally understands that love should not require her to slowly disappear.
