A Lovely Event

Early this morning, I was in the kitchen rinsing off the breakfast dishes before going to work. A thud against the back door caught my attention and I went to investigate. Lying on its back on the sidewalk was a young bird, its feet in the air.

I picked up the downy creature to see what could be wrong. Some misplaced feathers on its head indicated that the bird had no doubt flown head-on into the plate glass window. The impact had knocked it unconscious.

My first thought was to apply some of Baba’s Vibhuti [holy ash]. I quickly carried the bird to the living room to the altar where the Vibhuti is kept. The little bird’s head had already fallen over to the side, as if lifeless. However, I applied the Vibhuti and rubbed some into the feathers, admiring the young mockingbird’s coloring. The back was a soft muted brown, the breast white, speckled with brown. The open beak was still yellow. As I tenderly held God’s small creature, I began to feel a stronger heart beat.

Since the bird had to be protected from two cats until sufficiently recovered to fly again, my brother thought of the traveling cage for the dog and cats and fetched it from the garage. As I placed the little bird on the floor of the cage, it toppled and fell on its side. There was nothing more to be done. I went to my room to dress, as I had to be at work in thirty minutes.

Just before I left the house, curiosity prompted a peek inside the cage to see how my little friend was doing. The bird was balanced on its feet at the rear of the cage. Some progress had been made.

An hour later, the office phone rang. My brother was on the phone. Jubilantly he said, “I just took the cage out of the house by the Azalea bush and opened the door. The little bird flew up and out and away.”

Oh, what a lovely thing happened this morning!

~Esther Haworth
Source:  Sanathana Sarathi, February, 1979