Why the caged bird cries

It’s cry is shrill, sad, plaintive, and heartbreaking. And I have been hearing it almost every day for the past 5-6 months.

Our apartment is one of a block of some 50 or more, and the bird’s cries could be heard every morning and evening. Initially, I assumed the poor thing had been caught in a wire netting and was crying for help. But after some quick exploring, I discovered that the sad notes were emanating from our neighbour’s apartment - the wistful notes of a sad, caged bird.

The more I heard it, the more heartrending it sounded, and I began to wonder what pleasure it gave people to see a bird - a beautiful being whose raison d’être is to spread its wings and fly in the open skies - cooped up in a small, dirty cage. Isn’t it the height of selfishness to quite literally clip its wings and enslave it just so you can watch it cry and flap around meaninglessly in its little metal enclosure?

I guess what they cannot hear - or perhaps refuse to hear - is that every cry from that winged wonder is a plea, a protest, a prayer. A plea to be released, a protest against its unjust sentence, a prayer to feel the wind once again under its wings. Its sorrowful notes are not entertainment; they are a lament.

To cage a bird, I believe, is not to love it. It is to snuff out the very essence of what makes it a bird. In our selfishness, we rob it not just of space, but of purpose, of dignity, of joy. After all, isn’t true love never about keeping but about letting go?

I remember a short piece I read many years ago about a little girl who saw an elderly, grey-haired gentleman in a park buying several caged birds from a pet seller. After returning the weather-beaten wallet back into his well-worn trousers, the tired-looking man then slowly sank down on the grass and carefully opened the doors of the small metal cages, releasing the birds to fly free.

“Why are you buying those birds and then setting them free?” the little girl asked him, innocently.

The old man smiled weakly and, with a faraway look in his eyes, said: “I know what it feels like to be locked up for something you didn’t do.”

Then he slowly stood up and walked away.