“I wrote ‘aria’ one day over the summer, after I’d sat in my living room at dusk with all the windows open. At the time I was living in Michigan, and darkness had fallen over the day, but outside these sparrows would not stop their movement or noise. I found myself trapped in their twittering, in a dream-like moment of paralysis. My mind was still active, but my body was giving into the slow unwind of the day. I wanted to tell those birds to quit, but I also wanted to still be flying about the world with them. This poem is about letting go of the things we cannot change, about rest and resilience. It’s about giving into the songs that transition us from one day to the next, so that we may sing and fight again tomorrow.”