The Non-Existent Bird

Blue and Green. According to color experts, they are not supposed to go well together. But in nature, they are so light on the eyes.

If I was the bird on that tree, brown, like the color of eyes that I’m seeing her with, mixing so well with the blue and green, with a body as small as large daffodil flowers, what would I do? I would fly on to that larger, older tree, to see for myself, the secrets of the caves dug out in the brown, bulging, tough branches, which remind me of every other young man in my city, whose first homes are sweaty, colorless, mirror rooms. But I remain more interested in the littlest tunnels of the large, old, brittle, earthy, dancing branches.

Later, I could easily eavesdrop on people talking out loud and collect stories. It would be tricky though, as it is now when I’m not a bird. Because whether in presence of someone or alone, it is a wonder and a shame, that we humans, even though meeting each other so often, and have access to each other through so many gadgets and mediums, talk incessantly, but rarely utter anything that we think or feel. Almost as if, so afraid we are, of our feelings and thoughts and morality, that we end up using anything and everything to drown it all under, even when we are alone.

Half of our words seem to get spent on feeding and fueling our narcissism and the other half on masking ourselves and our insecurities. What kind of false image of security resides in our heads that we keep forever chasing it, with hearts not yet bloomed and more fragile than orchids. If I was that bird, I would not bother to listen to people. Only look and laugh at the faces they make and at their sense of self-importance.

If I was that bird, people would not cover their faces while hunting me.

If I was that bird, I wouldn’t feel so insufficient. What if, the patterns of humans have corrupted the world of animals, including that of the birds, along with the air, land, and water? What if, in a bird’s world too, one has to now prove the usefulness of their existence? If not, she is also looked down upon, for using up the air, tree branches, leaves, grains, and water. But that is a supposition, a human’s supposition of a bird’s world. Because look at me, like a typical man, going about rendering so much standing to what humans can do.

If I was that bird, I would be non-existent, in the city where tools, drones, wires, and sulfur fly.