She is small and frail, her little toes grip the branch and hold her fast.  The petite maple surrounds her in florescence in the afternoon sun.  She rubs her beak on her toes.   In and out, in and out.  I wonder what it feels like on her beak, the rough skin of her toes scrubbing the hard cartilage.  She sits low on the branch, hunkering in to the cradle of her frailness.  I held a bird once.  The warmth that comes from their little body is as soft and gentle as their downy puff.  A slight warmth that radiates away and hovers in between feathers. It is a warmth that is indescribable and untouchably fragile.

Suddenly she shakes and fluffs up her feathers.  Little flights of air suspend each feather and shines silver.  The leaves twitter gently under her volition.  Even the feathers on her head stand up higher.  The drops of rain that gravity forgot sparkle in the waning light.  She is illuminated in a halo of Divinity unknown to her.  From here I can see it, from there she cannot.

I consider from this moment the small miracle in an everyday place.  It has brought feeling to my heart, to my lungs.  I feel the air slowly entering and departing in a  new way.  She is a vision of beauty in my limited horizon.  I cannot take my eyes off of the place where she is shrouded in the evening darkness.  The brilliant blue of dusk back lights the tree branch.  She is invisible in the silhouetted leaves.  My eyes lose their focus and I blink the dry stare away.

Frozen in my gaze is the image of her; it is her beauty that animates me.  A memory in stark contrast to my empty, cold room.  I am small and frail and wrap my aged fingers around cold metal and wobble to my chair.  The old blue fabric is worn and threadbare.  It groans as I lower my bony frame into the comfort of the cushions.  I drift off to sleep watching my little friend flit across my desolate dreams.  I feel her warmth in the nook of my crooked palm.  We are small and frail and I follow her on a draft into the brilliant blue night sky.