On the Forest Floor

On the Forest Floor
James V. Harker, Jr.

Beneath some fallen leaves;
On the forest floor,
Lies a bird; silent.
Chirping no more...
The once esteemed beauty
Of his golden feathers,
Are now washed away,
By the rain and awful weather,
His wings are bent and broken;
He can barely fly,
The eagle-like heart he once had,
Is now beginning to die.
No one looks up to this bird anymore.
He is just another fallen object,
Lying on the forest floor...
The little bird, as he dies,
Looks up at the blue skies,
And no one even stops to cry,
Or to feel any emotions inside,
As his heart beats its last song,
No one wonders if they have done wrong.
As it was, the bird just needed love;
Love, all along.
But there was no one there,
To mend his broken wings,
There was no one there,
To listen to the song he would sing.
The people were too busy,
And too controlled by wealth,
To care at all about nursing a bird,
Back to proper health.
They could not look down,
To the broken, sad, and poor;
And spot a little bird,
Lying there,
On the forest floor,
They could not bend down,
And cup him in their palm.
They could not sooth him,
And make his beating heart calm.
But there was Someone,
Up in the sky,
He watched sadly,
As the little bird slowly died,
His hand reached down,
From the place in the sky,
It carried the bird up, up,
Way up high.
Now the bird is free,
Free again.
Free to chirp, free to sing,
A song of no end,
But, down here,
Where the bird once lay;
On the forest floor,
Things get harder;
Worse than they were before,
More things die,
And drop to the ground.
Things vanish away,
Without making a sound,
And while they are now happy,
We can not ignore,
The bird we left there to die,
On the forest floor.