Fiction | December 01, 1992

Three swans dropped dead this week and this morning there was a fourth on the street out front.  Nobody knows why.  Maybe they are choking to death, maybe it is a sign from God.  At first I thought it was a big pile of newspapers just starting to blow away but when I got closer I saw it was a swan with one wing spread out on the road as if it had tried to lift itself up.  Poor thing.  Already ants were in its eyes.  I called Buddy to come quickly I was so upset.  I did not know what it might mean right in front of our house and the baby due in three weeks.  Buddy said all it meant was that he had to pick it up which he tried to do but the body kept slipping out between the wings, it was hard to get a purchase.  Finally he dragged it up on the lawn.  I said I’d call the ASPCA, but Buddy shook his head.  “Virginia,” he said.  “It’s as dead as a doornail.”