One Dark Night

I wake up and it is still dark. The sky has lost its colour and the moon its shine. Tonight is metallic. The hardness of the black is like that of the mother iroko in prime.
This blackness I now see did not grow up today. It’s been ages since the Sun last shone. It is the strength, resilience and smooth softness of the moon I miss, the friendly breath of the Sun and the silky drawings in the sky. I long for those days when I could stretch out my hands and recast the images in the clouds, those bubbly images of ghosts.
I never knew night could be dark, so dark. I never knew the sun, moon and sky could be absent from the earth. The stars seem so distant their twinkle is lost. It will be long before day comes. I have waited for days for it. The black has nearly consumed me.
On this dark night I heard the dance of a family of bats that live across the valley. So I stopped for a moment to listen and sure enough I could hear the voices of the valley. Then I heard the cawing of the raven and the hooting of the owl. It was music to my ears. I listened harder and then I saw the voices beyond the valley. I saw the Savannah and the Prairie. I saw the tropical rainforest ahead of them. And I saw the singers weaving their way across the Atlantic unmindful of the border between Atlantic and Pacific. It was their songs that moved me most. They had no reason to sing. Yet they did.
When I opened my eyes again I could see beyond those bars they put me behind. Life swarmed around me. It wasn’t the earth that was gone. It was my song I lost. I fell in love with everything around me and decided to enjoy it all. I knew I might not have them one day. I noticed the smooth finish of the iron and the tender pull of the swing. I noticed the paintings on the walls and the plenty of guards I had all around. No president was more protected, no specimen more cherished. That was when I opened my mouth to join the chorus of the nightingales. Sure enough the sky came back when this caged bird took to singing again.