The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Critical Bird Song, or The Rising Costs of Beachfront
by Angela Yuriko Smith

The birds played a dirge upon the wires, a last mournful tune for the forest, for the meadows, for the world. No one listened to their lament for melting ice and dusty lake beds. No one looked up to see the silent bird song, punctuating a plea across our landlines. No one cared. We the people, the perpetrators, went on our way full of bustle and hustle, far too important to heed a band of birds making random patterns. What do birds know?

… until the birds went silent. Then we looked up to find the trees emptied of bird song, leaves and the annoying cicadas that horrified us. The barren landscape was finally devoid of spiders, dandelions and other pests. Flies and mosquitos, both history. We rejoiced at our newly created beachfront properties, and moderately mourned those now under the sea. With the rising temperatures, every state could be Florida. We celebrated, but what did we know?

Critical bird song
but our complaints were so loud
we missed the message.

Fiction © Copyright Angela Yuriko Smith
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com.

More from Angela Yuriko Smith:

Angela Yuriko Smith is a third-generation Ryukyuan-American, award-winning poet, author, and publisher with 20+ years in newspapers. Publisher of Space and Time magazine (est. 1966), two-time Bram Stoker Awards® Winner, and HWA Mentor of the Year, she shares Authortunities, a free weekly calendar of author opportunities at authortunities.substack.com.