The Heron and The Wind

It had been 27 years since the last person left the Chicago Botanic Gardens and the Heron waited. The Heron waited because that’s all that could be done until someone mended its broken legs. It had come into this world in flames so hot they burned blue and clear, but now the flames were gone. The person that had turned the still metal into the living Heron was gone, and so was the person who drilled the holes into the concrete foundation and secured the Heron into place, and so was the person who, on a dare, threw a rock at the Heron so hard its legs broke. With feet still bolted to the ground and its body on its side several feet away from the legs, the Heron waited.

All the Heron had for company was the stifling Silence and the wanting Wind that blew in from the Lake. The Silence missed the days when it had been calm and calming, and the Wind missed the grasses and the leaves and, especially, stealing hats of people’s heads so it could play with their hair.

The Silence hated itself for what it had become, and the Wind tried to find what it once was, and the Heron waited because one day it might meet the Wind, and the Wind could slip over and through the Heron and together they could sing a song to comfort the Silence.

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