caged sparrow, fly free

by Katelyn Deng, '27

Art by Yilin Chen, Westview High School '27

CW: descriptions of domestic violence and abuse

At least 90 percent of women in prison for killing men report having been abused by those men. Yet these women will spend an average of 15 years behind bars—compared to the 2 to 6 years served by men who kill their female partners. - American Civil Liberties Union, “Women in Prison”

When one hundred milliseconds decides a life,

I end up here. Rotting in this silver cage,

with bars of unforgiving steel and a 

floor of merciless cement. The fledgling who

has not yet learned to fly – or has she forgotten?

Feathers beaten, bruised, broken, a prideful

crest clipped away only for raw flesh 

blushing pink like ripe grapefruit,

bloodied like a mangled corpse.

A flickering shadow, a snarl that lingers –

heavy, hated, hollow in this concrete jungle.

Predators slink behind the corners of walls

with golden-ebony eyes glinting in salivating hunger

they watch me through these lustrous bars

claws reaching, teeth grinning, talons stretching

they wait for this battered sparrow to fall.

A price I must pay. A debt that I owe.

Because last month it came to this: 

the threats, the strikes, the memories, they

have seared themselves raw and bloody onto

my shaking plumage – smoke-black cigarette burns

against once-snowy feathers rotting away and

he does not recognize this battered, broken 

woman with a suitcase before her, ready

to fly far, far away from a loathed nest

and I know nothing of this man who I once loved

but now reeks with pot and whisky, fury and rage

hate and desperation.

He reaches behind the couch; I open the kitchen drawer

and we are each holding the creation of

his anger–my love–our fear–the pain grasped

tightly in our shaking hands, cold metal slick with

sticky, sweltering, salty sweat in this suffocating summer heat

and coated with us knowing

we will never go back.

The opening of a mouth. The narrowing of

eyes. The slightest movement of a hand. 

One hundred milliseconds and it’s all too fast. 

Too much. Too wrong. One hundred milliseconds,

yet I need to choose right now.

Do I call for help that always arrives too late?

Do I leave behind a motherless child?

The clock is ticking. One hundred milliseconds only.

Do I wait for him to pull the trigger?

Or do I pull it first?

Call me crazed, call me cruel, call me murderer.

Mock my bloodlust and doubt my pain.

But then – please – also tell me:

What should I have done

instead?