The Hawk

I've had much that I've wanted to say about faith lately, but I haven't been able to figure out where to start. My brain feels like a drain that is so clogged that nothing will pass through, even though there is much that probably needs to. This also doesn't feel like the place for it, though maybe it is. Rather than try to make sense of where I am right now, I figured I'd just share this short story that I wrote for my kids after our Easter all-nighter, based on actual events.

The Hawk

It’s Pascha, and I feel a weakness in my bones after a long night and early morning. This Sunday feels like summer, but the outdoor furniture and wooden slats beneath my feet are still coated with a light dusting of pollen. It hasn’t rained in weeks, and the flowers are wilting. I’m sitting outside on the deck with a full belly and a cold drink, attempting to focus on the book in my hand, as the sliding door opens and the kids wander outside to join me. They flank me on either side, Maura following her big brother’s lead, but both are silent as if one is waiting for the other to speak. Based on their awkwardness and the slow hesitancy of their footsteps, I suspect that they are wanting to ask me a question in which my answer, in my sleep-deprived state, will most likely be “no.” Do they want to go to the park? Do they want to go get ice cream?

Maura sneezes. 

Before they can even ask, something breaks through the stillness of the moment like a bolt of lightning, its sudden movement piercing the world around us. It is so close that I feel a breeze against my cheekbone as it passes.

“Whoa! Did you see that hawk?” Henry asks with a childlike wonder that I often fear he is on the verge of outgrowing. A screeching bird had darted past us, pressing the air beneath its wings towards the earth, as if to keep it from floating up into the heavens. Its song is like a battle cry.

“Are you sure that was a hawk?” I ask, having clearly lost my sense of childlike wonder. “It looked a little small.”

“Oh, it was definitely a hawk,” Henry says with confidence. “A baby one.”

A few brief moments pass, and I begin to realize that there are birds singing all around us. It is afternoon, but it sounds like the dawning of a new day. We hear the sounds that typically tell the tale of rebirth, of the golden light that cuts through the towering oaks, exposing the dewdrops on the ivy. Matins. I’m not sure if the birds have been singing all along, and my ears have simply not been attentive, or if it was the hawk who suddenly began conducting the many-winged and many-eyed choir in its afternoon psalm. We are surrounded. Their song is like a heavy rainfall. The rainfall that we need. The three of us sit in this encompassing cloudburst, drenched, as participants.

“What do you think that hawk was saying as it flew by?” I ask them. Henry smirks to himself, amused at the thought. 

“I don’t really know,” he replies after a few seconds. Part of me thinks that he actually does know.

“I think it was hungry and wanted some food,” Maura suggests. I bet there is some truth to that, too.

At that moment, the hawk makes another pass and perches itself atop the highest tree in the yard. We listen as its cry becomes louder and more present, and with it the wind begins to move, carrying its message far and wide. All of the other birds begin to sing with a greater intensity, and we can now truly hear their song. They now sing in our tongue, or maybe it is that we are able to understand theirs, or perhaps they are the same in this moment. To our astonishment, the song that had previously only resembled a heavy rainfall actually becomes one, but there are no clouds, and there is no darkness. There is only a cleansing rain from the clear blue sky that washes the pollen from the outdoor furniture and from the wooden slats beneath our feet. There is understanding.

As the color returns to the wilting flowers, I am taken back in time to the Paschal Matins service. Henry and Maura were on either side of me, just like they are this Sunday afternoon on the back deck. There was movement all around us: the turbulent dance of a thousand candle flames, Father’s determined march around the church as rose petals drifted in his wake, the grand jeté of the incense as it leapt from the censor, and the flight of the choir’s song soaring on wings like those of a baby hawk. All of these things were contained within a greater movement, something that resembled a heavy rainfall and was bringing new life to my entire world. “Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and upon those in the tombs bestowing life!” As we stand there, drenched, as participants, Maura looks up toward the sky and says, “I want to be a bird!”