Life of a badminton Birdie

How pathetic it feels to be bat around

back and forth, back and forth,

whizzing through the air.

Those rackets- how I hate those twins and their constant, silent swatting.

I see a world I will never touch,

green blades that flow in the sun’s light that I've never felt litter the ground.

I'm only allowed to see the small mountains of this desert and the net’s poles reach their limits marking its end.

That net- that stupid net.

That net that stops my flight short.

I cherish the few moments that I can soar above all things and hope for wings to escape the twins rough treatment, that stupid net steals it away.

Sand is my only ground- shifting, sifting through my holed body.

I am left in my place on the sand,

seeing the beautiful horizon form as day becomes night over the grassy world out of my reach.

I feel envious of the grass, it’s true that they are stuck in their places but at least they are alive.

At least they are able to sway with the breeze and not be forced to soar in spite of it.

I am nothing but a plastic hazard and a toy within the compounds of my lonely desert,

destined to be buried in this gritty, lifeless sand.

How pathetic a life if battered around day after day- stuck in routine.

My only home is the twins’ faceless strings that express no welcome.

The strings vibrate as they push into me so silently they scream and then they're gone, forever fleeting.

Or perhaps it is I who is forever fleeting, but fleeing where?

Nowhere, I suppose,

back and forth is all I'll ever be allowed to know.

Do I have another purpose?

One aside from being hit into air or dropped in the hot sand?

Will this forever be my existence?

Lost, forgotten, thrown around- am I the only thing to feel this way?

The game is over, the day is done,

the sand is turning cold,

the twins are valued and taken away- but not me.

Why not me?

Am I so replaceable?

How hard must it be to pick up your toys?

Is my name even known?

I am a Birdie but named so cruelly, so insensitively.

How ironic it feels to be named after a bird.

I am nothing like a bird.

No, no I only wish I were a bird.

A bird is free to fly higher than myself

with no limitations to their flight.

Hit after hit, time after time,

I question the existence of a world out

of the sand and above the clouds.

The existence of the birdie

the life only a birdie itself may take the time to think over

is all I'll ever experience.

Back and forth, back and forth

seeing a blurred world I only hope to someday know.