Random Stuff! Part Three!

caged birds {a story by dalvie}

(FOREWORD: THIS SUCKS SO BAD LMAO SORRY BUT IT WAS FOR MY ENGLISH HOMEWORK WOOT WOOT MORE INFO ABOUT IT AFTERWARDS)

I know why the caged bird sings, ah me,
When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore -
When he beats his bars and he would be free;
It is not a carol of joy or glee,
But a prayer that he sends from his heart's deep core,
But a plea, that upward to Heaven he flings -
I know why the caged bird sings!
( "Sympathy" by Paul Laurence Dunbar )

Caged Birds

I know why the caged bird sings, ah me.

    Ruth Kayana looked up from her worn poetry book and into the dusty roads of North California, onto the fields covered in a layer of brown and few workers covered in sweat. It was May of 1943. Her raven black hair was tousled by the hot wind, and it breathed down her neck. She turned her head to see her brothers playing basketball outside in the almost 100 degree weather. They shouted and cried as the makeshift ball flew into the air and banged on the metal hoop with no net. She wished she had wings and could fly away.

    When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore -

    Ruth stood up and brushed off her already dirty skirt. The fifteen year old Nisei, or American born Japanese, walked towards one of the fences nearby. She shaded her eyes and gazed towards the blue, cloudless, heat filled sky. A long wooden pole held barbed wires together, something the American government claimed was there for the Japanese Americans' "protection." The captives soon realized that it was for the Americans' protection, not for them. They were trapped and enclosed, just like the Jews in Nazi Germany. How incredibly ironic of the American country.

    Ruth started humming a small tune to herself, a melancholy lullaby her mother used to sing to her as a child. She began to pray, as she did daily, towards the cloudless and blue sky. She prayed for her family, for her friends. Ruth asked for protection from the upcoming winter and for safety for everyone she knew. She prayed for freedom.

    She stood up again and shook her head. Who was she even praying to? The president of America?

Ruth tied back her hair to keep it from blinding her with a small scrap of fabric and began to walk back to her family's cabin.

    When he beats his bars and he would be free.

It was more of a hut than a cabin, to be honest. They shared it with two other families, and it was very cramped. There was a small baby in one of the families, and he liked to cry. When Ruth had first arrived in the place they called "Manzanar," she tried to leave. She would try to break the wires and escape with her brothers. They soon learned it was fruitless. The wires were strong and sharp, and the stern soldiers would always catch them.

Ruth sat down on the wooden steps and watched the bird inside it's metal cage. It was her brother's. He had caught it one day and decided to keep it inside of an old cage he found somewhere. She didn't understand why they wanted to keep it. It was a dull grey, no more than a common bird. It sang sometimes but not as many times as Ruth would've liked. It mostly tried to escape out of the cage. Her brothers liked to call it "the Stupid Bird." Ruth called it "Tori Tori;" tori or 鳥 was the Japanese word for bird.

It is not a carol of joy or glee.

Ruth watched as the bird started to sing a little. It was a croaky melody full of crackling warbles and strange twitters. She always wondered what type of bird Tori Tori was. It sang loudly but not joyfully. It's song was more like the melancholy lullaby from her mother. She wondered if the bird knew what it was singing about, if bird songs actually had meanings.