A mother’s tear

The light autumn rain began to fall. The yellow leaves in the garden lit up. The large grapes under the vine swelled and their skins began to crack. The purple blossoms bent over the cracked pot sitting in the fallen autumn leaves.

The young swallow curled up at the bottom of the pot and shivered with cold and grief. They were all gone. His two sisters flew south. His mother had flown to the warm lands. Who will keep him warm in this rainy night?

They left him alone in the pot, because he was crippled and couldn’t fly.

In the summer a fire broke out in the house under whose eaves his mother had made a nest. While the old swallow was able to snatch her babies from the fire, a coal fell into the nest and burnt his right wing.

The little chick had fainted from the pain. When he came around, he saw that he was in a new nest, and his mother was sitting over him, her head bowed. He tried to flap his wings, but couldn’t, as the burnt wing had withered.

Summer rolled by. The grapes darkened. The buds of the flowers in the garden burst.

Swallows began to gather on the telegraph wires. They were getting ready to go South. The wires began to look like rosaries.

One morning the old swallow brought her crippled youngster to the garden and said:

“Dear child, we are going South today. You can’t fly, so you will stay here in this pot. I’ve laid soft feathers for you. When you feel hungry, rummage outside, the whole garden is covered with fruit. See the beautiful purple blossoms bowed over the entrance to the pot? Don’t be sad. We’ll be back in the spring.”

“Thank you, mother, for taking care of me!” murmured the crippled chick, and to hide his tears he put his head under his mother’s wing and went quiet.

And then they were all gone. The dark days rolled in. The light rain started falling. The purple blossoms drooped even lower over the pot. One day a raindrop rolled down the lowest petal of a purple flower and prepared to fall.

“Oh, how tired I am!” she sighed.

“Where did you come from?” asked the swallow curiously.

“You won’t believe me. I’ve come a long way. I come from the Great Ocean. I was born there. I am not a raindrop: I am a tear”

“A tear? What tear?” the swallow rose anxiously.

“I am a mother’s tear. The story of my life is short. Nine days ago, a tired and teary swallow landed on the mast of a large ocean liner. I stood in the right eye of the grieving bird. The ocean was roaring. Strong wind was blowing. In a frail voice the swallow uttered to the wind:

“Brother wind, when you travel over the world, if you pass through Bulgaria, stop by my orphaned chick and tell him to beware of the black tomcat that prowls around the garden. I forgot to warn my child before I left. Tell him also that my heart is withered with grief.

“Where is your baby swallow?” asked the wind.

“I left him in a cracked pot, rolled in the garden, where the purple flowers bloom”.

“By the time the old swallow had spoken these words, I had rolled from her eye. The wind snatched me up and blew me all over the world. Nine days I flew. Here I am now, fallen on this flower. How tired I am! I want to drop and fall asleep”.

The crippled swallow’s heart jumped. He rose quickly, opened his beak, and swallowed his mother’s faint tear.

“Thank you, mother!” he whispered, laid down in his feathery nest and fell asleep, warmed by the tear as if he were under his mother’s wings.