There is a small bird slowly dying outside on our doorstep.

It is all black save for it's pale underbelly and brilliant flashes of orange. At first glance, it was not even a real bird. There was one wire-like leg sticking straight out and spots of eyes that were not open enough to reveal the life behind those crusty lids. I stopped. It looked like an interesting little toy, like the fake birds people sometimes decorate their house or indoor plants with. I knelt down closer. This was not a fake bird. Fake birds don't heave their chests with this kind of random repetition. Fake birds don't die. I wanted to help. No bigger than a salt shaker, I was sure that had he any broken bones, there would be nothing that I could do. Sometimes animals die. I know this. I wanted to end his suffering, but ... (there's always a but in these kinds of matters) ... who am I to decide that this birds truly has seen his final minutes. Maybe it's been decided. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe, five or ten of thirty more minutes of the most violent pain of your life, is still your life and all the more precious because it's ending, despite or perhaps because of the pain. While there is pain, there is life. While there is life, there is pain. Perhaps this story could have reached similar conclusions had it been about the birth of a small bird on our front doorstep.