Counting Birds
The sky is bright blue. A half-moon shines defiantly white in the cheerful morning sky. A short formation of geese flies across its face. There are four of them in an asymmetrical v. They’re black and white, all feather and wing, graceful long necks, nasal honking, wing beats, a flurry near perfection. Crisp, clean, distant.
My life makes more sense in the context of these sightings. All the hurrying about to earn an hourly wage and spend it to sustain my bodily processes occurs so that I can see birds. After seven hours of selling whatever to whoever, counting the dollars as if my next breath depended upon it, and hearing and saying all the unimportant repetitive things that people say, I step outside and look up.
A hummingbird somersaults over my head in the blue expanse above. On either side, long naked tree branches frame the scene like white fingers extending from outstretched hands. I take a deep breath and watch. Hovering, the hummingbird looks down at me as I gaze up at him. Then he performs an enthusiastic series of aerial maneuvers, lands on a branch, and launches again to catapult back over my head, appreciative of an audience. It’s the most important thing that will happen all day. It is joyful.