The birds dot the skyline like a vial of spilled poppy seeds on a baker’s countertop. They flit here and there like a crazed game of tag. All at once they change direction, like they’ve stumbled upon a sleeping bear, eager to run away in case it should wake.

I stare up quite dumbly at the sky, trying to search out some pattern, some secret message from God only to me in their contemporary style of dance. But the birds are erratic in their flight, never staying too long in one congregation.

The sky was so still only a minute ago. I could hear the breeze as it tickled past my exposed ear lobes, my hat not quite doing its job. 

And then, bam! The flutter of a bazillion wings takes flight, the upward and downward pull of air rings in my ears.  My eyes scan the sky, but daylight is blocked from my view as black feathers, all vying for first place in an unwinnable race, swallow the light.

What fun they are having soaring here and there. A smile spreads across my face. Who will I root for? Who do I hope wins? The underdog is always a top choice. I see him now, a lonely stray apparently missing the invisible cue to bank to the right. He flies more left for a few seconds before realizing he’s all alone and so stops short and turns to catch up. He’s almost there. He’s almost rejoined the flock.

And then, it’s over. This show of black fireworks. The birds pick a towering pine and descend all at once.  How still the sky becomes again.

“So the last will be first, and the first last.” Matthew 20:16 ESV