Song of the Dead Sparrow
Nature lay subdued after the night’s violent storms, cloaked in a cool, windless dawn. Sammy wandered the streets scavenging for debris. The skeletal remains of skyscrapers—derelict goliaths—hoarded treasures in their heights, but scaling their unstable frames was suicide. The monks had always waited for wind and weather to deliver the scraps of a lost era down to the earth. It'd been this way ever since the old world crumbled in 2020.
Sammy ambled without direction, his cold blue eyes—hardened by the solitary winter—scanning Chicago’s cracked pavements, gravel-strewn expanses, and overgrown fields. Summer’s lush grasses, once teeming with vermin, lay parched and sparse, their golden blades brittle underfoot. Encountering another soul would be a miracle. Brother Gabriel once claimed thieves and thugs had prowled these ruins, but now wild dogs, gray wolves, and black bears roamed the city. Venture farther out, and moose, cougars, or elk stalked the land.
Sammy had grown accustomed to solitude. Brother Clarence had joined him on these walks until gout left him hobbled. Then pneumonia swept through the monastery this winter, leaving Sammy all alone. The excursions were reckless, he knew, but what else was there? Time stretched endlessly—distraction was worth the risks. A flicker of movement caught his eye near a gnarled tree, its roots clawing through thin grass. The rustle of life felt alien in the silence. Wariness warred with curiosity. “Better to know”, he thought.
There, thrashing in the dirt, was a small bird. One wing hung mangled, reduced to a bloody stump, while the other beat the air in frantic, futile circles. Its eyes bulged, beak dripping crimson. It had WuFlu. Sammy hesitated, torn between mercy and morbid fascination. Before he could act, the fluttering ceased. The bird lay still.
The Abbey in the Oakwood, oil painting by Caspar David Friedrich
Death had always been a thief. Father Gregory’s heart had stopped without warning when Sammy was eleven. The shock of a vibrant, confident man turned into a grotesque corpse carved the first wound—a raw betrayal. Death stole many more over the years. Loss piled upon loss until only emptiness remained. Abstraction softened death’s horror, but witnessing it stripped away illusions.
Suddenly a shaft of light pierced the clouds, bathing the tree in an ethereal glow. The grass, the bark, the bird’s iridescent feathers—even the blood—blazed with vivid color. A celestial spotlight, as if the sparrow’s end warranted heaven’s notice. Sammy’s breath caught. In that moment, he saw beyond a pointless, ugly, death into the bird’s life: a hatchling’s first flight, wings gliding over open skies, years of song flowing from its soul. The ugliness of its end did not eclipse the beauty that the sparrow ever lived. The songs remained in the memory of God. No good, beautiful thing was ever truly pointless no matter how it ended. For Sammy, the monks’ wisdom once so clear and bright had become drained of meaning in their absence. Now their words rushed back with renewed and deepened vigor.
Sammy returned to the silent monastery and rekindled the tower beacons. Light pierced Chicago’s decay, a promise of warmth, hymns, and sanctuary. Others might come—or not. The monks were gone, but joy, faith, and fellowship could still dwell here. Whether it lasted a day or a century, it mattered little; the light would call strangers home.
Years later, he gazed at blurred faces and heard echoes of voices. “Father Samuel is dying” they murmured. Those living in the monastery had taken to calling him that. “I'm not a monk, just a guest here like you,” he'd reply. He whispered gratitude—for life’s blessings, trials, and for the song of the dead sparrow. Then he closed his eyes, his soul ascending. At his burial, they lowered the casket into the earth. He had been a guest, they agreed, his gaze ever fixed beyond the horizon—to where the song of the dead sparrow echoed in eternity.