A blood-red feather leaves a scar upon my hand / No longer stranded like a painted bird on a fan.... -- Chris Cornell, "Scar On The Sky"
Feathers and wings have been really important to me in the last 8 weeks or so. When Mom got really sick, the songs that resonated most with me were songs that had to do with flight, wings, feathers, being airborne..... I think maybe God, the Universe, etc. was preparing my mind and heart to let her go for her final flight. And on her last full day, 6 weeks ago yesterday, I sang "Given to Fly" and "Scar on the Sky" to her. We chose "Turn Turn Turn" by The Byrds (!) as the song for her slideshow -- and I had completely forgotten that Mom and I saw Roger McGuinn (of The Byrds) in concert at the Peace Center Amphitheater back in '92 or '93. Wings, feathers, flight.
Ever since mom's passing, I see birds and feathers nearly everywhere. Stray feathers in parking lots just there in my path. Birds coming near my car -- not in a suicide dive-bomb fashion but just near it. A couple of times, it seemed as if they were going to alight on the car.
The feathers appear out of nowhere and I haven't picked them up to keep.... Mostly because when I tried to do that as a kid, I'd hear mom saying, "Put that down, oh my gosh, you don't know where that came from or what disease that bird might have had! Are you crazy??" Yep, that's my mom -- I saw beauty and wonder, she saw disease and disaster.
I had bought a pair of red feather earrings a few years ago, intending to wear them as part of an autumn ensemble. I may pull them out again and wear them as a reminder of mom. Blood red feathers leaving not scars on my hands, but sweet memories in my heart and the occasional sting of tears in my eyes.
No comments:
Post a Comment