Here Comes the Sons…

Inside were four young roosters. Trapped without food, water or kindness, they had been discarded as though their lives held no value. But these wee lads from who knows where had a different melody to sing. Refusing to let their stories end in the dark, they broke free and stepped right into the arms of kindness.

Not, however, before leading their rescuers on a rather spirited dash around the lake!

Three of the boys were quickly brought to safety. First was a handsome, gentle Faverolle cross who became John Lennon. Next came a spritely Game bird with a voice so magnificent and soulful it didn’t just announce the dawn; it celebrated it. Naturally, he was named Paul McCartney. Then came Ringo Starr, a tiny bantam gentleman with an extraordinary plume of black tail feathers.

Yet, the band wasn’t complete. For several anxious days, we wondered where the final member had gone. Then, just as hope began to fray, he appeared. Fashionably late to the reunion, a beautiful brown Silkie boy we named George Harrison completed our feathered Fab Four.

Today, the boys spend their days doing exactly what roosters were born to do. They scratch the soil for treasures only they know exist, they dust-bathe in the earth and sing a symphony of songs every heart should hear.

Sadly, their story is no longer unusual, as more and more innocent birds, just like them, are being abandoned in taped boxes, dumped in forests or treated as inconvenient possessions rather than living beings. It is a betrayal of trust that we must never allow to become normal, though a large part of our society already has.

Roosters ask for so little: a safe place to sleep, a patch of earth to explore and the freedom to greet each new morning.

Perhaps the greatest tragedy wasn’t that these four boys were left inside a taped-up box, but that someone believed they belonged there.

At Edgar’s Mission, every rescue begins long before a hand is extended and it doesn’t start by opening a gate or even a box.

It starts by opening our hearts.

For every act of cruelty begins with forgetting who someone is. And every act of kindness begins with remembering.

Because the moment we stop seeing “just a rooster” and start seeing:

John,

Paul,

George,

and Ringo

… that is the moment everything changes.

For them.

And, perhaps, for us too.