The crime laid at my doorstep…

I held a dying bird in my hand today.

Today was the New Moon and I was preparing to do a ritual, as I do at each Full Moon and New Moon. I’ve been letting one of my cats, Cerridwen, go outside during the daytime. She’s a rescued street kitty and has plenty of survival smarts, she loves being outside and it eases up the feline dynamics in the house. Cerridwen is very small and very cute, I’ve posted pictures of her here on lj. But she’s quite a little hunter.

I heard her mewing outside the door and let her inside, and I saw immediately that she had something in her mouth–something quite large. I spotted the long stiff tail and knew she’d caught a bird. Cerridwen is the first cat I’ve had who is really a birder. She catches the voles and mice, too, but this is the second bird she’s caught, that I know about.

I took the bird away from her, because I didn’t want her to tear it apart in the house, and I really didn’t want her or the other cats eating it. It was still alive–just barely. It wasn’t moving very much, and didn’t struggle at all. There was great torn wound under one wing, and it couldn’t move its feet. If I put it down, it fell limply onto one side. It opened its eyes and looked at me vaguely, its beak gaping. As far as it was concerned, being rescued from Cerridwen by me was simply going out of the frying pan into the fire. I’m not sure what species it was, something brown and sparrow-like, but it seemed larger than a sparrow.

I put it outside, on the miniscule chance that it would recover if left alone. There were large drops of blood all over the slate slab in front of the door. They were very bright red and looked more opaque than blood usually does. There was blood on my hand, too.

The bird did not recover.

It thunderstormed all afternoon. It thundered during my ritual. Part of the ritual involves burning a paper in the fireplace, near the end. As I was kneeling watching the paper burn, thunder boomed right overhead. I heard it echoing down the chimney. I’d never heard that before, but I usually don’t spend thunderstorms sitting in front of the fireplace.

It’s been a very strange day. I’ve been utterly exhausted and drained all day and evening and I can’t figure out what’s wrong with me.

I haven’t let Cerridwen out again, much to her discontent. I’m not sure when I will. The birds are nesting now and I don’t like her catching them.

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