Does the Bird Die?

A swallow would not be able to say “death,” and I imagine it would not experience it as I do. I live daily with the understanding that one day I will die, and this awareness shapes my life in a way that differs from the swallow’s, for whom death may be an experience like flight—simply another event. Strictly speaking, I do not even know whether (in her world) she dies, since she does not name it as such.

She would not say that something hurts, although she would undoubtedly feel it. Thus, the most I can do to approach her existence is to dance what I understand to be her life with its sensations.

It is curious that only humans dance. Perhaps language is responsible? I dance because I observe and name, I dance because I think abstractly, because I will die, I dance because I am alive and I conciously celebrate it.

[Photo above by Carlos A. Segovia]