Idiosyncratic.: Scandalous families.

1/29/2010

Scandalous families.

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The boy and his falcon - One of my favourite stories.

Once there was a boy.
When the boy was six years old, his father gave him a falcon to train.
Falcons are raptors - killing birds, his father told him, hunters of the sky.
The falcon didnt like the boy, and the boy didnt like it either.
Its sharp beak made him nervous, and its bright eyes always seemed to be watching him.
It would slash at him with its beak and talons when he came near: For weeks his wrists and hands were bleeding.
He didnt know it, but his father had selected a falcon that had lived in the wild for over a year, and thus nearly impossible to tame.
But the boy tried, because his father had told him to make the falcon obedient, and he wanted to please his father. He stayed with the falcon constantly, keeping it awake by talking to it and even playing music to it, because a tired bird meant it was easier to tame.
He learned the equipment, the jesses, the hood, the brail, the leash that bound the bird to his wrist.
He was meant to keep the falcon blind, but he couldnt bring himself to do it - instead he tried to sit where the bird could see him as he touched and stroked its wings, willing it to trust him.
He fed it from his hand, and at first it would not eat. Later, it ate so savagely that its beak cut the skin of his palm. But the boy was glad, because it was progress, and because he wanted the bird to know him, even if the bird had to consume his blood to make that happen.
He began to see that the falcon was beautiful, that its slim wings were built for speed of flight, that it was strong and swift, fierce and gentle. When it dived to the ground, it moved like light. When it learned to circle and come to his wrist, he nearly shouted with delight.
Sometimes the bird would hop onto his shoulder and put its beak in his hair. He knew his falcon loved him, and when he was certain it was not just tamed, but perfectly tamed, he went to his father and showed him what hed done, expecting him to be proud.
Instead, his father took the bird, now tame and trusting, in his hands, and broke its neck.
I told you to make it obedient, his father said and dropped the birds lifeless body to the ground. Instead, you taught it to love you. Falcons are not meant to be loving pets: They are fierce and wild, savage and cruel. This bird was not tamed, it was broken.
Later when his father left him, the boy cried over his pet, until eventually his father sent a servant to take the body of the bird and bury it.
The boy never cried again, and he never forgot what he learned: that to love is to destroy and to be loved is to be the one destroyed.
From City of Bones by Cassandra Clare.

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1/29/2010

Scandalous families.

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The boy and his falcon - One of my favourite stories.