Thursday, May 30, 2013

Squeezed Out



This bird high above this densely populated part of the world seems to want to ask us a question. Is there any life down there besides human? Is there any room for him and those of his kind?

We've made this world what it is today. We've squeezed out every other life form but our own. Still, even the most fragile beings have learned to live around us and with us. They may not thrive as they once did before we built and bulldozed and paved and poisoned. They may not survive the dangers we present to them daily: belching smoke stacks, spinning wind turbines, speeding cars, insecticides, fishing lines and gear left to harm whatever comes into its path, and lead shot from hunters who leave carrion for wildlife to consume and ultimately sicken.

Unknowingly we kill them, willfully we kill them, and for everyone of us who protects them there is another who would feel nothing at their loss.  I know this. I have seen it with my own eyes. We all have.

Since childhood I've been a softhearted animal lover. It's ingrained in me, but still I learn each day about the lives of these others who live a hard fought life, searching for sustenance in a world that is sometimes not abundant with its resources, in a world where we have removed or revoked their right to resources.  Yet every year, birds build nests and in their own purposeful way try to raise another family to keep their kind in this inhospitable world of humans. 

Imagine if we could just all let them live their God-given lives.  Would it hurt us one little bit to have a care for others besides ourselves?  I don't know who to credit for this photo, but it made me stop to think.