I was in a rush to get back to the house after church on Sunday. I was not feeling well. The dog was not feeling well. I just wanted to be in bed.
As I walked around the corner in our alley, I stopped dead still. Perched on the edge of my neighbor's garage was one of my dream birds: an American kestrel. Still. Small. Shimmering. Almost within my reach -- if I had dared to reach out and touch the face of Horus.
I have long been obsessed with falcons. When I was in the seventh grade, I read a tale about a boy who had captured a falcon by tying a sky-blue piece of wood smeared with glue to a leather thong attached to a pigeon. When the pigeon was released, a falcon attacked it, became entrapped in the sticky wood, and plummeted to earth. The crafty boy then captured and trained the falcon to hunt.
It was a boy's tale. Probably full of far more bluff than fact. But I was willing to try it. A friend raised pigeons. I bought one -- and that is as far as the story went. I never did get around to setting my trap. I was a dreamer, not an engineer.
The bird on the garage could have been a descendant of the falcon I never caught. I watched him. He merely looked at me with exasperation. He had a job to do. Squirrels needed catching. And I was crimping his style.
He soon tired of my idle worship and slowly lifted himself on falcon's wings -- to glide effortlessly to a Scotch pine, where he resumed his watch for an unwary squirrel, mouse, or vole.
I left reluctantly. He revived a dream. Or the memory of a dream. And, in this case, the ending in the real world was far happier.
As I walked around the corner in our alley, I stopped dead still. Perched on the edge of my neighbor's garage was one of my dream birds: an American kestrel. Still. Small. Shimmering. Almost within my reach -- if I had dared to reach out and touch the face of Horus.
I have long been obsessed with falcons. When I was in the seventh grade, I read a tale about a boy who had captured a falcon by tying a sky-blue piece of wood smeared with glue to a leather thong attached to a pigeon. When the pigeon was released, a falcon attacked it, became entrapped in the sticky wood, and plummeted to earth. The crafty boy then captured and trained the falcon to hunt.
It was a boy's tale. Probably full of far more bluff than fact. But I was willing to try it. A friend raised pigeons. I bought one -- and that is as far as the story went. I never did get around to setting my trap. I was a dreamer, not an engineer.
The bird on the garage could have been a descendant of the falcon I never caught. I watched him. He merely looked at me with exasperation. He had a job to do. Squirrels needed catching. And I was crimping his style.
He soon tired of my idle worship and slowly lifted himself on falcon's wings -- to glide effortlessly to a Scotch pine, where he resumed his watch for an unwary squirrel, mouse, or vole.
I left reluctantly. He revived a dream. Or the memory of a dream. And, in this case, the ending in the real world was far happier.
