To a man, the ‘death’ of a bird,

There’s no meaning in that word,

For birds do live or die,

Matters little to the human eye.

To me, the ‘death’ of a bird,

Ushers a touch of gloom in that word,

A depressed sense of sorrow,

Deep in my heart o’er a sparrow.

Of all the places around,

How the little sparrow found,

A roof-hole, for its groom,

In my busy office room.

They both settled inside,

The tiny nest of their pride,
Flirting and searching,

Caressing and perching.

Their shrill and sharp noise,

As they flew across,

Tilted my mental peace,

Keeping me ill at ease.

My superior complex forbade,

Their trespass over my head,

Out of they flew, at my chase,

But back they came, in retrace.

Their unbreakable obstinacy,

Won o'er my supremacy,

As I got reconciled to them,

With the passage of time.

A straw or a feather drop,

From their tiny nest atop,

I threw out from my table,

Thereafter without a grumble.

What a shocking fatal day,

The  ever remaining sparrow gay,

Fell dead, belly ripped open

By the speeding ceiling fan.

There remains still the tiny hole,

And my past memories of the bird’s role.

Lo!  The  bleeding lifeless sparrow’s body,

Lies in state before me even this day.

~Rajaram Ramachandran~