They came in a black cloud of commotion from the sky. A hungry scream of shrill caws descending. The winter had been hard. It had whittled their bones so thin that they could barely hold the dark feathers of their wings in the air. They gave no thought to anything else, but the emptiness inside. The need to eat and procreate. The first sprout of spring may be beautiful to a poet’s eyes. That is not so for all the other creatures the Earth does hold. They were named aptly that throng of birds, they were a murder of Crows and that’s what they brought with their talons and beaks. Cracking the shells of awaited life, tearing the flesh of those expectant.

There at the first crack of dawn were the witnesses. A parliament of Owls sat without judgment. They had done a similar thing, but never together and always in silence. One of them with its head more than halfway round looked at those feathered shadows and pronounced without emotion, “Everyone there is alive because of them.”

The mutation of Thrushes, on the other wing, found a different perspective. They held fast to the Earth watching and warding their nests at the beginning of spring. Before that first crack of dawn, they had began to sing. A chorus between them of a sustained whistle and ending with a softer, echo: oh, holy holy, ah, purity purity eeh, sweetly sweetly. But before their song could raise their hearts, they saw their hope scattered in broken shells. They saw their lives torn apart. The first sprout of spring may come in blood and caws raising screams.

There at the crack of dawn were the witnesses. A wisdom of Owls, as they can also be called. They had no verdict, neither for nor against. They knew they had the same sharp beaks, the same sharp talons which tore and stripped flesh from bones. One of them, with a blink of those so amber eyes without bias for either side, gave speak, “Everyone there is dead because of them.”

They all agreed with a slight bobbing of the head. Their parliamentary wisdom well-known. Most things are the way they are because of everyone here or there. And most importantly in any judgement those last three words: because of them.