To the Right of the Rising Light

The street light nearest the park seemed to be the old bird’s favorite pole. Each time, morning or afternoon, depending on my day’s schedule, when jogging toward the park, I would pass beneath that pole. More than often the old bird was sitting on it. At rare times he would be sitting alone, but it was more common to see many of the regional birds perched with him. During my first encounter with him, I briefly interrupted my run, paused, and looked up at him on the pole. He cocked his head down toward me and stared back. It was a quick eye to eye contact. I looked away, shook my head as though I was coming out of a brief trance, and resumed my jog.

That night, I awoke late, and sat up at the edge of my bed. I gazed into the darkness. Images unfamiliar to me were racing through my mind. I had somehow acquired the knowledge from that old bird on the pole, and knew what he knew. Since I was not sure how long these new ideas would stay with me, I hurriedly went to my desk. I began scratching notes on any blank piece of paper within my reach.

As a younger bird, the old crow lived many miles to the north, a birch and pine wilderness where there is less human activity. He came three days south from that place to live among a larger population of humans in their suburbs where artificial lights extended the length of each day. The old crow liked the light pole as a perch because it gave him a good view of the humans working and playing around their shelters. He mostly enjoyed watching the nonhuman activity that occurred around the neighborhood of humans.

The old bird was a story teller for the nonhumans in the region. That seemed to account for the many feathered visitors that were often near him. His stories were about nonhumans. They were stories about what he had observed in his northern home. There were stories about the nonhumans in his new home. He also had stories passed to him from other story telling crows he had known in his youth.

Many of the nonhumans of the area went to the light pole where the old bird sat, and asked him for a story. The old crow found pleasure in telling them a story. There were times when he sat alone and remembered a story if something caused him to think of one. However, his first choice was to tell a story to group of listeners. To perch alone was not his regular practice.