Fly Eagle, Fly?
African tale, a farmer, whilst looking for a lost goat after a storm, finds
an eagle/egret but when he brings it home, tells his children it is a
chicken. The egret acts like one as that is what it sees and has no other
guidance. A friend of the farmer sees the 'chicken' and tells him it is an
eagle. He lifts it and says: "Fly Eagle, Fly" but it falls to the ground
and scratches in the dirt with the other birds. He comes back a month or so
later and takes the now much larger 'chicken' to the top of the farmers
house and tosses it from his hands calling out: "Fly Eagle, Fly", but it
flutters to the ground and scratches in the dirt with the other birds. A
few months later the 'chicken' is fully grown and the friend returns in the
middle of the night and takes the bird and farmer out to the mountain, to a
high precipice. The friend places the eagle on the edge of the ledge. As
the sun wakens and cracks over the distant mountains, the eagle, whose head
is under its wings, wakens and looks towards the sun. It feels the warmth
of the air and stretches its wings out. The friend goes and pushes the bird
off the ledge and it falls, but as it falls downward, the wind ruffles
through its feathers and the eagle opens them and soars upward. The bird
flaps its wings and gains altitude, the sun and wind taking it higher, and
the friend cups his hands to his mouth and calls: "Fly Eagle, fly. Be who
you are, not what others tell you."
The end.
