The robin parents frantically cheep and cheep, or should I say cry and cry? I hear one for the longest time up near the top of the Aspen tree. From the other end of the area I heard it. Are they calling a warning to the lost babies? Are they letting them know to stay put, wherever they are under the foliage?
From the tree! A baby! At the corner! Dad stays with it. Dad stays low with it, near the ground, making the same call as the mother: “cheep…...cheep…….cheepcheepcheepcheepcheepcheep” the first two sharp and loud, then the last ones mumbled and trailing off. They sound so frantic! The baby makes little squeak sounds in response. This baby is all the way to the fence, near the gate. It flutters at the base of the fence. Will it listen to dad? Will it understand? Louder squeaks! Everyone is scared! Dad is on the ground with it, then dad goes to a branch right above it. The baby flutters to the base of the tree. The little precious conversation of life and tenderness continues. Dad flutters near the ground. Mom makes her call still from up high. The baby heads to the sunflowers. It is too active! It should stay still! I want to put it in the nest!.....but I fear that would only multiply stress and compound problems. The baby sits on a rock fully out in the open. It needs days before it can fly! It sounds so lost and forlorn and scared and perplexed and puzzled and worried! It flutters toward me. Surely it would never sit still in the nest again.
The little one hops under the overhang with me! It hops onto my foot! Such plaintive little chirps! It stays some time on my foot. Should I again try to put it in its homey cozy little nest? Has its adventure satisfied it and is it ready to go home? Would it stay this time? What to do?! What not to do?! It hops off, looking for home, reaching the base of the stairs that lead to its home. Oh, to rescue it!
It wanders around, its oversized feet hopping under the roof, its undersized wings unable to even fly over the drainpipe. I hear raindrops. I hear thunder. The best place for it is surely under the overhang right where I sit. It has gone around the corner. Mom cries. Dad cries. The baby cries. The fate of the other two baby robins remains unknown. Hopefully one remains in the nest.
Is this what happened to us? Did we leave the nest too soon? In good time would we have been given access to the Tree of Knowledge? Is that why we are so lost and confused, having simply stretched our wings too early, falling out of the Garden, not yet ready for our inheritance as children of God? So God calls from on high, the Christos comes down to our level, we all cry and seek shelter from the storms.
Robin dad still calls from the pine tree.