Just Another Bird

I lifted it by its brittle bird legs and walked to the swiftly rushing stream behind my garden, the one that knew only to run and never stop, its mucky grey flow undeterred by all the trash trying to choke it.

I looked down at the stiff little green carcass, once a bird I had loved, now grotesque in death. The bird was gone. What remained was a thing of stone, its flesh hardened, lifeless, repellent. It deserved a watery grave.

I raised it high, aimed at the rivulet, and let fly. It landed with a perfect splash, vanishing momentarily before surfacing again, a green blob flung into motion, tumbling madly downstream. Up, down. Up, down. A dead thing powered by the flow, kissing a boulder here, a branch there, a stiff form caught in the current, racing towards oblivion in some cesspool in the earth's belly - to be enmeshed in the slime of all the other dead.

Once, I might have buried him, set him in soil, let flowers bloom above his bones, in a pot on my terrace. But today, the stream would do. Convenience is everything now. Why linger over what is dead and lost?

Author's Note

A disjointed chapter.

Reviews

[Dennis Wolf]

Yup. Desensitization working its magic all 'round the world. All hail our 21st century global dystopia established under the guise of inclusiveness, justice and equality 😁 and of course the super long hours of paid slave work shifts and... The ads everywhere, ads inside ads about ads about people who just wanna take money you don't have for conveniences you don't need (unless you want to establish dependencies which can easily be taken away) 😁 yes, and the bird doesn't get buried, because it's more convenient this way 😁also because all the birds are actually government spy drones, that's why pigeons sit on powerlines, to recharge. They are the old, bulky models with less efficient battery🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣



Okay, so hopefully I didn't just start some awkward conspiracy theory group with that joke 🤔 ahhh back to all seriousness.


The cycle of life is real, and, humans sometimes have trouble accepting that. Things die and get broken down... We kill things every day just to survive...
I loved this one, because it's so detached but it's not.

[AYVID]

We are human and death messes us up however hard we may pretend otherwise. Desensitization is what we look for, so I like that word.

And I really like where you went with this. I don't blame myself or anyone else for tuning out at the wrong moments. There's just too much going on to process.
Thank you for reading and liking this piece. I'll try to go in an overdrive now hehe.

Cheers. :)

[Dennis Wolf]

It was a good read. Revealing a bit of everything. That's how I imagine decent material. Cheers.

[AYVID]

Thanks 😊🥂