The Mallard

An untouched light in the shape of a ring whispered a wish into a rusty pond. “I long to come from the dirt,” it said. “The muck and grime, before I rise.” The willows shrugged, and the crickets laughed, but when sight had turned to sound, and the light could not be found, in its place sat a mallard.

Its beak, stooped down, couldn’t help but shriek, when it saw itself among the ripples and the leaves, a mossy bulb atop a frumpish muddy figure. Its wings, once so fair, ornamental, were now rough, industrial. Its voice, once born of a harp, now reduced to broken-stringed squacks. The light had never seen that prosaic weed that festers, beneath the forest flowers. That certain hell that engulfs a humble beginning

But across the shallow water, the koi-fish, toad-frogs, fire-flies were whistling and screaming. Blinking, bubbling, and wailing. In their unison, louder. A cacophony of their maims, that caused a friction in the ear but also seemed to tame.

Hidden in the tall grass, made known by their obnoxious clucks, was its own procured herd, the ugliest train of ducks. And when the new member presented itself, the rest flailed about in gusts and in shouts. As the mallard looked upon the crowd with distaste, its beak lifted up, high and in vain. How was a light so bright to mingle with the dull cogs moaning below?

Just as the mallard was about to leave, it felt a harsh pull at the bottom of its wings, ropes of mud tying it down. Limbs jerked, and it squealed of pain, entrapped under the thick rut. But in the corner of its eye, four of its own kind, emerged and drew the mallard straight out of the muck. Towards the clear blue, into the circle. The mallard looked upon its saviors, its compeers.

A brown feather, a flap, and a quack, and the stranger had become kin. The mud sticks to them, but it sticks to all the same. Familiarity wraps them in a cover, that is clean and safe, and the stars are better wished on from below.

Dawn broke once more, and the light, at its height, had returned. As it looks below, the filth and soot remain, a nightmare come and gone. But now, it may seem, behind those same weeds, a herd of mallards shine a bit brighter.