Do birds dream? I am sure of it. For how else could they learn to sing and fly?

A dream reconstructs things that are new in the mind, further reinforcing learned concepts.

But what if one bird did not sing or fly? What if her days were all the same, dark and clouded by the disease of blindness, that it would become indistinguishable from what was—or was not—a dream? Night and day blend, where reality becomes fuzzy. If everyday she sat upon a cage, waiting from morning to evening in the same manner without deviation, limited by a lack of talent for song or absence of sight to fly, she’d be stuck in an endless cycle of dreams—unable to tell what is true with her own eyes. In time, her memory fades as well, left with no sense to distinguish between a nightmare and life. I hope there is enough to comfort the old bird.

She moves about still, with the energy which all life is given, but is trapped within the realm of what she had remembered before her sight ceased. Reality is subject only to her imagination, and from there, even her own house becomes a dream. The human’s voices echo out through the house, but how does she know we’re fake? Still, she waits, climbs, and calls. It would seem that there is still life for her, but—it all seems fated already. Over and over and over again, in the same old fashion, she lives on. Her life is a dream, and she’s trapped within it.

I fear only a mere evolutionary instinct is what keeps her from giving in. What does she wait for? My affection—she does not receive it often. Perhaps, death—death would be the only liberation from this dream—this pitiful nightmare. Everyone must wake up eventually. Nothing else would bring a change to these cold nights.

Dream or not, there are still things she enjoys. Head scratches, playful banter, grass seeds. I suppose those things are enough to live on. Even if it all may be a dream. There are seeds of happiness, found in this darkness. It is a life that does not mean much. What can I learn from this?

Featured Image: 2B from NieR Automata