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| Photo from the public domain |
The morning after my mother died, a sparrow crashed into our large picture window. I rushed outside and stood looking down at it—a rumpled little female sparrow, her dangling head and convulsed feet and splayed wings telling the truth. One more small heartache. I bent and picked her up, Dead. Except, when I folded her gently into my shaky hand, I felt a slow, frail thump against my fingers. Her heart had not yet quit. I could not lay her down, could not give her up. For several hours I cradled this little body, stroked the twisted neck, untangled the claws, folded the wings. Sang to her . . . and walked blindly through my chores, holding her close.
My mother's
heart had beat slowly like this, a small, persistent thud-bump, a metronome, for
days beyond the dying of her self. Now
I had to wait it out, walk it through again, for reasons that I could not
formulate.
At the end
of a long morning, birdie suddenly stirred against my palm. Her eyes flicked
open, shut, open, staring at me. No fear, simply "Who are you?" I
talked to her softly, ran my finger lightly down her neck, and felt the sudden
strength that straightened it. At that moment, Life was the sparrow and me,
breaking through a barrier. There was nothing else. She wriggled suddenly, and
I turned her over, stroking her disheveled back. Holding her just loosely
enough to give her wiggle-room.
We walked
around the yard thus while she squirmed, cocked her head, surveyed the
landscape. I took her into the kitchen, slipped her gently onto the table.
At first she
simply huddled there. And then, in a beautiful slow motion dance, she began to practice
the patterns learned as a hatchling. Doing
push-ups, getting the kinks out, maybe. Strengthening her matchstick legs—those
springboards to a good takeoff, which every flying critter needs. Up and down,
toenails gripping the tablecloth. She swiveled around now, perfectly content to
use my table, my kitchen, for her pre-flight maneuvers—stretching her wings,
nodding her head elaborately, like a dancer receiving Bravo's.
Slowly I reached,
cupped her in my hand again without her protest, and carried her out on the
deck. And then I heard it, for the first time: from a nearby pepper tree, a
frantic bird call. A sparrow, of course, over and over, a small, shattering
lament. I knew. Birdie knew.
I put her on
the railing. She shook herself heartily, leaned ahead and cocked her head forward,
one last time, like a runner at the chocks. Off she went, dipping a bit
precariously . . . and then, and then she
soared. A grand flutter of leaves high in the pepper, a raucous duet. Home.
Resurrection. A trail of tears that
comes to an "impossible" end—Life renewed at the end of end. And yes, my frail little mama was
Home, I knew.
A strange
way to say miracle. But we always
need new language, new framing for the housing of our hopes. For the phrasing
of our falling and our rising. We too soon forget. That's what has happened,
too often, too ubiquitously, to Resurrection.
It's too often buried in the tomb, having died a thousand-thousand deaths by the hands and words . . . and yes, the
hollowing of messengers who speak by rote, who have never fallen, broken by
life . . . and soared.
Before we
make that final plunge into the unKnown—that precarious, breathless,
extravagant dip and rise upon sudden
wings—we are granted many a rehearsal,
many an encore. Learning to live fully and die often. Little deaths: a
sudden snap between the synapses—ZAP!—and
eternity breaks loose in the sludgy soul, the bloated brain, the brittle heart,
and something new comes forth. A small, bare death, and a delicate cell of
Truth is born, unfolds, flowers. An "Aha!"
A new perception out of the muck of our last thought. The act of Genesis again.
And ever again. Unending. That possibility which proves the
impossibility of impossible.
Where we are called to live . . . in all
the small and untidy and heartbreaking places.
