A Prayer for Sneakers

Sneakers

The following tribute touched my heart deeply and I requested permission to share. Once you read it, I know that you will understand why. To all the wild birds who have passed through our homes…

On March 15, 2013, Marie Charon Crowley shared that her Sneakers had passed away. It turned out Sneakers was a wild-caught Conure who lived her final days with Marie at Feathered Friends of Michigan, a parrot rescue in Michigan. Marie wrote:

I’m gonna miss her a lot. I expect to lose many/all of our old wild caught conures over the next few years and then they will all be gone from captivity and released to the great blue skies…

Sneakers had been with me for months and she is my old wild caught girl (conure) who I had to have wings amputated. We don’t see with the stress she was under all her life; how she could have possibly carried it all that time.

I always read [this Navaho] prayer when things are hard. It made me smile to think of her like that. So it was my prayer for Sneakers. To be happy, to be healthy to flying free.

The wild caughts know what they lost. She would sit and stare at the sky for hours and just soak in the sun.

A pair of wild Nanday Conures (Black-hooded Conure) devouring a mango
Refugio Ecologico Caiman, the Pantanal, Brazil

Prayer for Sneakers

Navaho Prayer adapted and dedicated to those who have saved, and been saved, and loved, and lost. I didn’t think the Navaho Gods would mind if I borrowed their prayer. —Marie Charon Crowley

To you who dwell in houses made of man
To you my greatest love in my darkest hour
You have accepted my sacrifice
I have lived your all

My feet restore to me
My wings restore to me
My body restore to me
My mind restore to me
My voice restore to me

I am released into the bright blue skies.
Today you have released me into the bright blue sky.
May we fly together in the bright blue sky.
May we hear our young in the bright blue sky.
May we sing our song in the bright blue sky.

Happily I recover.
Happily my interior becomes cool.
Happily my eyes regain their power.
Happily my head becomes cool.
Happily my limbs regain their power.
Happily I hear again.
Happily for me the spell is taken Off.

Happily I fly

Impervious to pain, I fly
Feeling light within, I fly

In beauty I fly

With beauty before me, I fly
With beauty behind me, I fly
With beauty below me, I fly

I am released again into the bright blue sky.

A flock of wild Nanday Conures (Black-hooded Conure) in flight
Pousada Campo Neta, Necolandia region, the Pantanal, Brazil

Links:

• Feathered Friends of Michigan
• Wild Conure photos from Parrots International