Will I Fly?

Will he?

He could finally breathe. He could make out the light. He'd been in the cardboard box for an hour and fifteen minutes. The box continued to shake, move, and fling him against the box's walls. He had no idea where he had ended up, but he was certain it was far from home. The distance has gotten so far from his home, which is all he could remember as long as he was in that box-the home that was a bird seller shop-the shop where he was born in a cage-in a cage where his siblings and mama were helpless as a pair of human hands came in from the door and caught him-hands had to catch him because someone bought him-bought him because the colour on his feathers was so vibrant and brilliant-those beautiful feathers were his curse.

Another set of hands entered the cardboard box, grabbed him, and placed it in its new cage. A bird was already present there. As the purchaser who took him home swung the cage onto a longer rope, it began to move. In one compartment there were grains, while in the other there was water.

The other bird saw his plight and made an effort to strike up a discussion, letting him know they name him Adam. Adam tried to treat him nicely. He had never had a name at the store, so he was unaware of it. Regardless, he is aware that only birds that live in human homes receive names. He denied Adam's request for his portion of the grains and spent the entire night at the bottom of the cage attempting to escape and return home to see his mama. There, in his mind, arose the question: Will I fly?

Spending the whole night in the darkness and not having any grains from his share, in the morning he picked on some of his grains and took some water. He didn't know how but he knew that the sun had already raised. He remembered his mama's tales which taught him how a bird can sense the sun, wind, leaves, its nest, and food. Every day at this time, customers enter the store via the entrance, keep their faces extremely near to the bird cages, and point out with their fingers a few of the birds as a hand reaches inside the cage and catches it; they never see that bird again.

His mama taught him and his brothers a poem that they should never forget and that should they ever be taken away; they should remember to return home. Not the bird seller shop but the great forest. At first, he had trouble remembering it, but subsequently, he was able to recall every word of it.

The wind blows as if it knew the way home,
To the north in summer and to the south in winter.
If it's hot, you fly with it.
Against it, if it's cool.

If the sun is yellow, against it.
if clouds are more. Fly with it.
Fly and fly till you reach the great forest,
it's where we fly honest.

He was distracted from his thoughts by the voices of a bunch of kids who were gathered around the cage and jumping to touch it. He was terrified, but Adam reassured him that it was okay because the proprietors only let the kids watch. A young boy in the group urged the large, long-haired person - called mom - next to him to take him near to the cage. The adult smiled as the boy looked happy for getting closer to the cage and looked at the bird's bright plumage, while the one in the cage cried for his mama. Will I fly? was still the same thought in his head.

Days passed. The cage became familiar to him. He got used to the brightness of human smiles when they looked at him and the darkness of his fear inside him at night. He became weaker and began to converse with Adam, learning about the timing of the replenishment of the food and water, the extended period of time when no one would visit the cage when the doors of the house would be open, and about the operation of the door cage.

He questioned whether Adam had ever tried to escape the cage and return to his family, but Adam had no family and had already been in the cage for a year. Adam never made an attempt to unlock the door or devise an escape strategy. He was told by Adam that the place was superior. He refused to allow those words to enter his mind. He yearned to leave the situation and return to his mama and brothers. He only needs to take a flight home. Will I fly again? he inquired.

Weeks passed. He watched the world around him. He observed how they opened the main door to replace the bottom sheets as well as the doors to the water and grain compartments to refill them. He then began practicing using his beak to open the water compartment's door. When he detects nearby humans, he won't do it, but he makes a valiant effort to lift it up and attempt to flee.

The rhyme states that all he has to do to get home is to fly accordingly. Fly to that vast forest where only his kind exists, to the afterlife where he can live forever without ever having to enter a cage again, and to that flock of birds where the wiser members are who are well-versed in the ways of the city. He only needs to fly to that older bird, whose experience might be able to guide him back to his mama. Will I fly? he questioned himself again.

Months passed. A year passed. He made an effort, hurt his beak, and mustered the strength to open that one tiny door and fly to his right, but he was unsuccessful. He was close to giving up, but he refrained from doing so. The hymn to his mama got stronger over time, but it was still impossible to open the door; the main one is out of the question.

On that particular day, a child who was taller than the others and whose eyes were level with the cage looked at them directly. Although he didn't know, the young boy's eyes gave him the impression that he could assist him. He said that the young boy would aid in our escape, but Adam already regarded him as crazy for attempting to escape the cage.

He and Adam slept that night. He woke up to find the cage's main door wide open in the early hours of the morning when the sun had not yet risen in the east and the entire house was silent. Adam was already gone when he turned to look at Adam because he couldn't believe what he was seeing. He approached the cage's gate's edge, was reminded of the rhyme, looked from both sides, thought of the great forest, thought of his mama, and leaped.

He tried to fly high by fluffing his wings and opening them, but he was unsuccessful in doing so. Because the wind felt still and he could feel himself falling, his wings were useless. Fluttered them once more, but all that was left was the pain in his arms. He hit his head on the floor after falling to the ground and hitting his body. He didn't move; instead, he lay motionless, staring at the cage bottom and sensing the slow, one-by-one disappearance of all the dreams he had been holding onto for all these days. He forgot how to fly. Since his birth until the present, he has always been in a cage. A bird's natural instinct to soar through the air was destroyed by his cage.

His artistic talent and his ability to fly were eaten by the cage. He lay there with his eyes fixed on the room's ceiling as tears streamed down his cheeks. Laid there as he realized, he would never be able to fly again, even if he were free of the cage, reach the great forest, even if he could follow the wind like in the rhyme, and see his mama and siblings, even if the tall child helped him by opening the gate. He was lying there without sense, without strength, without hope, and without wings. Everything has lost its meaning, but the hymn of his mama resounded in his ears and gave him reason to take to the air once more. He wondered, however, if he would succeed and asked himself again the same question: WILL I FLY?