[dVerse] May 11th - The Bird Did Not Fly

The Bird Did Not Fly

By Tuesday morning, the cage had learned my name. It said it softly, in Ma’s voice, from the kitchen window where the caged parrot hung beside the basil. I had returned after twelve years, with a suitcase and no husband, which in our lane was worse than arriving with a corpse. Ma made tea. The parrot scraped its beak against the brass bars. “You can sleep in your old room,” she said, as if mercy had furniture. I opened the window. Outside, the night jasmine leaned in, reckless, fragrant, almost free. And the faint perfume from its chalice steals— into the room, into the cage, into my lungs. The bird did not fly when I opened the latch. Neither did I. We only looked at each other, ashamed of our training.

~ Oizys.

Word count: 131
Written for dVerse Prosery — Paul Laurence Dunbar, hosted by Dora on May 11, 2026. The prompt asked us to write a piece of prose fiction in 144 words or fewer, using the line from Dunbar’s Sympathy: “And the faint perfume from its chalice steals—” This is fiction. Mostly. The cage is innocent until proven hereditary.