Well, I just found a dead fledgling robin in the greenhouse.
It can’t have been out of the nest more than a week or two at most, and this
one hadn’t got by. It saddened me, even though it shouldn’t. I know we all come,
and we all go, and maybe we all come back again, and there are no exceptions, but
there’s something special about birds that I’ve tried to describe before. They’re
proud creatures – alert, aware, independent, fragile, courageous. I gather
their presence is encouraged in prisons as therapy for long term offenders.
They seem to embody the life principle better than anything else. Their heads
never droop in resignation.
And so to find one cut off even before he’d got properly
started on the big adventure, even before he’d got his adult plumage, well, you
know…
6 comments:
My heart sinks when I see the little ones that have fallen from their nests, I seem to be forever an undertaker at this time of year
Yet another sprinkling of avian synchronicity. The first bird I saw this morning was a beautifully plump robin who flew across my path.
I'm particularly taken with the fledglings. They look so juvenile with their brown and cream speckled chests, and yet they've already got that knowing look in the eye.
That's what I love about birds. I have a birdsong question, in the woods the other day I heard what sounded like someone gargling, any idea what it might have been? I ran it through google but it pretty much said don't be ridiculous as it turned up nothing!
No ideas on the gargling, I'm afraid. I included the sound of gargling in a story once, but that was a demon preparing to materialise and tear somebody apart. You haven't offended any powerful magicians, have you?
I shall be on my guard in the woods...
Have you read MR James's short story 'Casting the Runes?' I borrowed his demon for my story. I think you'd probably like it, and I suspect you'd find yourself siding with the bad Mr Karswell, as I did, rather than the priggish protagonist.
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