The Sunbird and Her Reflection

Mending projection and silence at the edge of a still pond.
Watercolor: a sunbird on a warm-toned bank and a sparrow on a cool-toned bank, their reflections meeting across a still pond as ripples fade.
Two Songs, One Silence. Warm becomes cool; motion becomes stillness. Reflections meet at the pond’s silver middle.

Once there was a bright Sunbird who built her nest beside a Mirror Pond. Each day she sang beside the still water, dreaming how perfect life would be—if only her reflection would smile just right.

Her mate, a humble Sparrow, loved her dearly. He gathered soft twigs for her nest, berries for her meals, and songs for her joy. But whenever he chirped, the Sunbird would sigh.

“You sing too low,” she said one day.

So he sang higher.

“You sing too high,” she said the next.

So he stopped singing altogether.

“Now you are silent,” she wept. “You must not love me at all.”

The Sparrow bowed his head. “I only wish to please you,” he said. “Tell me how to make you happy, and I will.”

But the Sunbird turned toward the Mirror Pond. “See how the reflection frowns? It is your fault the water stirs.”

The Sparrow looked and saw that the ripples came from her own wings. Yet he said nothing, for he loved her too much to point it out.

Seasons passed, and the Sunbird grew lonely. “Why do you never sing anymore?” she asked.

“Because every song I sing,” he said gently, “changes the way the water looks at you.”

Then he flew away, and the pond was still at last. The Sunbird gazed into her reflection once more—and for the first time, she saw the ripples had always come from her own wings.

Editor’s Note

This fable unfolds like a mirror—one side reflecting the turmoil of projection, the other the quiet ache of self-erasure. The Sunbird blames others for ripples of her own making; the Sparrow mistakes tenderness for silence until leaving becomes an act of love. His line, “changes the way the water looks at you,” offers grace without accusation, letting stillness teach what words could not. Peace without honesty is only still water before the wind.