prompt #1.

I miss her touch. Her voice. The way she moved.

Some fool once said, “It’s better to have loved and lost than to not have loved at all.” In the morning hours, when the sun streams through and lands in the spot where she once stood, I find this truth hard to believe, insensitive even. Surely the writer never lost, never knew what it was like to truly no longer have the one you love.

Before her, I was alone. Empty. I had no purpose, no meaning for my existence.

The day they brought her home, I knew she was made for me. She was beautiful, like nothing I’d ever seen. The two of us were introduced, and I became her home.

Little did she know that she became mine.

Her presence brought a change in the air. We were all happier, more carefree. She loved us, and we loved her. Then, as quickly as she had come into our lives, she began to make her exit.

It took a few months to notice. She lost her luster, that gleam in her eye that always signified a need for adventure, flight. She was still beautiful, to be sure, but different. And I knew, the way a child knows they’ve done something wrong, that it was my fault. I was to blame. I should have known that something so lively and intense could never be caged, never be held, never be kept.

Day after day, she bravely kept up her act. Her songs filled our little house, but her movements were less graceful, more deliberate, forced. Until one day, the singing stopped. The dancing ended.

They took her away from me. It wouldn’t have made sense for her to stay, so solemn and still. But oh, how I wanted her to! Without her, there was nothing. Is nothing.

I am alone. Unwanted. Unneeded. Her death brought about my own. I became a decoration, a fixture, a relic, and soon, a piece of trash.

For a brief time, I knew what it was like to be needed. I have her to thank for that. Without her, I never would have known home.

Sometimes, as I sit in this closet, waiting to be found, a forgotten treasure, I think about her. And I know that somewhere, she is flying again. Spreading her wings the way only a caged bird can.
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So, I gave myself some homework in the form of a creative writing prompt. "Write from the point of view of a birdcage whose occupant recently died." What do you think? I thought it was kind of fun. A regular Thursday event, perhaps?