There are some thing in this world too big to be nameless, but too small to find the words for.
Leaving work today, I came across two sparrows lying in the bike path. The female, dull in her feathers, was dead. The male, coloured more vividly, sat squatted, with no fear of me. I've always been puzzled as to why, in the bird world, the attractive sex is the male, the complete opposite our own. Nonetheless, in moments such as this you tend to anthropomorphize your thoughts, and you imagine suddenly a sparrow chirping for it's dead wife, struck motionless by grief, paralysed so that predators become meaningless - but let's be honest, Bambi was probably at most dazed when her mother was killed, but there was probably little more to it than that.
I picked up the female and placed it in some nearby bushes. I put the male in my palm, and just started to ride home with him. I have no idea what point there was in this - but - both his pupils were dilating and contracting - I figured if he were to die, let it be in my backyard, not some roadside nature strip.
I covered most of the 2k's back to my house, one hand to my chest with sparrow, the right gripping the handle that controls my front brakes. A couple of times I thought how ridiculous it would be if, in attempting to protect this bird, I'd crash into some mum collecting her kids from school and become a paraplegic. I can't imagine getting much sympathy at the hospital. "Male sacrifices spine for sparrow."
Regardless, I started passing under the plane trees that line my street, and this funny little explosion of feathers and life erupted in my hands. He flapped himself away above the rooftops.
Bastard didn't even say thanks.
I picked up the female and placed it in some nearby bushes. I put the male in my palm, and just started to ride home with him. I have no idea what point there was in this - but - both his pupils were dilating and contracting - I figured if he were to die, let it be in my backyard, not some roadside nature strip.
I covered most of the 2k's back to my house, one hand to my chest with sparrow, the right gripping the handle that controls my front brakes. A couple of times I thought how ridiculous it would be if, in attempting to protect this bird, I'd crash into some mum collecting her kids from school and become a paraplegic. I can't imagine getting much sympathy at the hospital. "Male sacrifices spine for sparrow."
Regardless, I started passing under the plane trees that line my street, and this funny little explosion of feathers and life erupted in my hands. He flapped himself away above the rooftops.
Bastard didn't even say thanks.