// The Fledgling //
Nature is a wild beast. Bundle of skin and beak, barely feathered. Displaced. Now I, halted morning walk, am too, googling: “What to do when you find a baby bird on the ground;” “Cheep cheep…” hopping to me, it asks, “Are you my mother?” (The book I read a thousand times to my little birds.) I’m mother, but not yours. Needy. Now I, desperate to help, am too, praying God will take this, bird and burden of walking away. I must walk away. Abandoning cries, I wonder, am I a wild beast? Hopeful. Now I, hours later, stopping to check on it, am too, but not for long. Hope gone as ants crawl in and out and over the beak that cheeped, the tiny lifeless bundle. And now I, roaring waterfalls cascade from my eyes, am the wild beast - an angry, stampeding wildebeest a sad, weeping willow a mourning, bellowing elephant mama. How does anything so vulnerable make it here? How does a mother leave? How does a mother grieve? Witness. Now I, invested, am too; embracing every moment holy in the hands of a sovereign Creator - the life-giving, the life taking; first and last breaths. I am just passing by, another animal, another beast. Nature is a wild beast.
Oof that was sad but also beautiful ✨