Raven
Just last night, our new exchange student from Croatia told me how he wanted to keep a raven – as a pet – once he got his own place someday. Just a few hours before, I had read Paul Laurence Dunbar’s “Sympathy,” the poem that gave Maya Angelou the title for her autobiography: I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. (http://www.americanpoems.com/poets/Paul-Laurence-Dunbar/15528) Our exchange student loves ravens and loves Edgar Allen Poe. I love ravens, too, and can understand Poe’s appeal. Hoping our shared appreciations would give me passage into his belief structure, I ventured a question, “Do you think this kind of bird would be happy in a cage?” “Oh, I would let it out three times a day,” he replied.
And just this morning, I saw a raven. I was out for my walk, and I was thinking about the wagonload of hay sitting outside the pole barn, waiting impatiently for hardy hands to empty it. It was going to rain soon, and so time was most definitely of the essence. I thought about the sweaty, itchy work and how I really shouldn’t try to get out of it this time. I was all caught up on my Country Folks writing tasks, and I hadn’t taken my shower yet. I usually do that first thing, but this morning the breeze through my bedroom window was so luscious with the night’s moisture that I had to get out in it as soon as possible.
Preoccupied with my conscience and the thought of hay and laundry, I heard the raven before I saw it. I might not have recognized it by sight anyway. It was a young one, about the size of a crow, and I tend to forget the distinguishing details of a raven’s body when I’m looking right at one: the ruffed throat, large beak, and rounded tail feathers. Instead, it’s the sound that always gets me.
Take a crow’s “caw, caw.” Give it a few drinks and a will to party. Bring it down an octave and add a long history of all-night binges. Make the bird psychotic, too, while you’re at it. That’s a raven.
And the flight pattern is nothing you wouldn’t expect from a voice like that. Wheeling and swooping with a manic glee, these birds live to push the limits and feel the adrenaline rush. And they’re big; they own the air and they know it. I picture a bunch of nineteen-year-olds out joy-riding, gulping the night air from windows all the way down, chasing trouble and having one heck of a good time doing it.
The thing is, even though my anthropomorphizing is really obvious, even to me, I still can’t shake this vicarious feeling of wildness when I watch these birds. It feels great, and I love the fact that they’re just carrying on their daily business of living – just being – while doing all this other stuff. I’m sure every bit of it is integral to the mundane details of life as a raven, but it seems gloriously unnecessary in the same way that gorgeous architecture seems unnecessary to a courthouse or other seat of democratic government. We know this is what makes us soar, inside.
I watched the raven for awhile as it plunged and canted, croaked and cawed. All along, it must’ve been working at finding its breakfast – some rodent our cats overlooked, or an egg or two in a poorly hidden nest. I can’t believe it really felt the kind of abandon I had projected onto it, but who knows. I’m fairly certain any trace of it would be snuffed out in a cage. I just wish I could take a bit of it for my own and use it on some of my less pleasant tasks of daily living. I don’t need a lot of thrills, but maybe a few could help me feel more inclined to help move the hay.
