Psst, Snarklings . . draw closer. Ease tight together and snug-up a touch against your mama's knees. Hold hands for courage now, and I'll tell you the beautiful-sorrowful tale of the First Light BirdAngel.

Once upon a time a shimmering BirdAngel was flying over Earth and -- what, my pets? You don't know from BirdAngels? Oh, goodness, Little Snarks, they're amazingful wondrous creatures, they are. They float and soar, spin and dive, all flicker-shiny; Light their only partner, else they dance alone. Now each BirdAngel brings with her (yes, every one of them a girl) a singular gift so extraordinary that mortals believe them to be magic. Why, once I heard a pulsing BirdAngel sing a song so sweet that rubies and emeralds, sapphires and moonstones bloomed in the meadow, perfuming the air with tinted lights.

Early one lazy summer morning this particular BirdAngel was flying over Earth, her golden hair haloing her lovely countenance, her flowered wings spread wide, when her eye was captured by the joyful minuet of daisies . . the silly gossiping of ravens . . the frolicnessosityness of dogs . . the snickery superiority of cats. She flew down to take a closer look.

Enchanted by creatures wearing their Essence on the outside, she decided to stay just a little longer, just a tad more, just an eentsy while extra, beguiled by their effortless beingness. Having only been exposed to humans, our BirdAngel found herself delighted by this unguarded expression of self.

Compelled, she began to paint: a seduction of roses, a quarrel of cats, a cacophony of crows.

She painted Essence on everything she could put her hands on: fence posts and garden pots, boxes and ceilings, tables, chairs, ottomans, doors. Paper and canvas, cotton, silk, mirrors, cabinets . . why, anything with a surface could end up with Essence exquisitely re-told upon it.

Soon the children of humans (being still somewhat close to their own Essence) began to notice.

"Could we do that? Can you show us how?"

So, our marvelous BirdAngel began to ever-so-patiently show the children of humans how to funnel True Light through their own eyes in order to perceive and recreate the Essence teeming around them.

Now, Little Snarks, BirdAngels were never meant to live on Earth. It isn't their no-place-like-home Home. And our precious BirdAngel had way overstayed her visit, after a time even forgetting who she really was and where she really belonged.

One evening in early autumn, while gathering Light and paint, she heard an unearthly sound. A bell? A chime? Her name whispered on the Moon Wind?  And, just like that, she remembered. Who she was, where she came from, where she belonged.

In a heartbeat she was gone.

Her BirdAngel gift? The extraordinary ability to see with True Light and recreate Essence in ways visible to human hearts.

Her name?
Dawn Phelps McConnell