At Home: The Tiger Bird....part 4

A snowflake twisted its way through the forest canopy and landed ever so gently on the tip and the sharpest point of the Tiger Birds beak. The heat from its boney holes at the ridge at the top of her beak had already forced that snowflake into a slippy slide to the very point until it dripped. The icy drip, a very purposeful drip, fell like a sharp stone onto the sleeping boys forehead.

The Tiger bird, raised his head skyward, distracted, listening. She raised her feathers like a cat raising its hackles at its own reflection. She sensed that something was slipping away from her. Something was disappearing. She focused in on that tiny body beneath her. Its tiny heartbeat slowing. She could hear that, just like she could hear the tiny noises from inside her own warm eggs. She knew life. She also knew life fading.

Another snowflake fell, this time landing on the boys perfectly formed nose. Its was perfectly unbeak-like. This snowflake, didn't melt. The infinite formation in tact, awaiting its inevitable change. Time. Change. Time is changing him.

The Bird left, but only for what seemed a moment, for what seemed to be one breath of air, and returned. This time, its didn't stand over the child. Its moved with intent and purpose, moving the earth around the boy. Scraping and scratching the dark soil from the crunch and crack of the dried oak leaves, a glimmer appeared.

A beam of sunlight spread through the canopy, snowflakes cascading through it, striking the glimmer into a beam of gold. The tin.

The snowflakes quickened. A heart beat. The Tiger bird lay close to the child. Time. Change. Life. Another heartbeat. x