How Halley's Comet Came To Be

Once upon a time there was a little bird who could not fly. She was hatched just like normal birds, naked and ugly from a fragile blue egg, and she grew up just like other birds, alongside her brothers and sisters in a little woven nest of twig and twine and down. The nest was high in an ancient gnarled oak tree, perched just below the canopy of the forest. The little birds in the nest could see patches of sky through the leaves, though they could never see the whole thing.

The little bird’s brothers and sisters loved to look up at the sky when it was blue and bright, and when the sun shown the little bird’s mother would teach all her children the songs that all birds know: songs about white clouds and warm breezes and juicy worms crawling slowly through the deep secret dark below. The little bird’s brothers and sisters learned all the songs their mother sang to them, and she would coo and chirp over what fine birds they would make when they were grown.

But the little bird was different. The bright sun hurt her eyes and the heat of the day burned through her thin feathers and stung her fragile skin. At night, when her mother and her siblings and all her fellow birds across the world were sleeping, she loved to look up at the velvety black night and the diamond-dust stars. When the moon passed across the gaps in the leaves overhead, she loved to look at that too. The little bird loved the view from her nest, but she wished she could see the night sky without the leaves of the trees in the way. She dreamed of flying high over the trees, higher than any bird ever had, until she reached the stars.

The little bird asked her mother if any bird had ever flown high enough to touch the stars.

“No, little bird,” said her mother, “Birds can never fly to the stars. For when the stars are out, so also are the owls, the greatest fear of all birds everywhere.”

The little bird asked her mother if there were any songs that birds sang about the stars and the moon and the deep secret darkness above.

“No little bird,” said her mother, “Birds never sing of the night. For night is when the keen hearing owl, enemy of all birds everywhere, is on the prowl, and to sing would be to invite death.”

So, the little bird kept her love of the stars to herself, and she never sang to the moon, though she longed to and felt the song bubbling deep inside her like a secret.

The little bird watched, and waited, and grew. One by one, the little bird’s siblings learned to fly and left the nest. The little bird was the last to spread her wings. Her mother worried about her. She worried that she would never learn to fly. But the little bird had a plan.

She waited until it was night, until the moon was high and full, and all the other birds were sleeping. Then she fixed her eyes on the moon and spread her wings. She soared above the treetops, and saw the star-studded sky spread out above her and the moon, round like a nest and beckoning. The little bird let out a cry of joy and flew higher still, till she could almost touch the sky.

The little bird was so focused on flying high enough to reach the stars that she didn’t see the silent-winged black shadow until it glided in front of the moon like a shadow puppet. By then it was too late. The owl, enemy of all birds, terror of the night, reached for her with terrible twisted talons. The little bird saw its luminous yellow eyes, saw its pupils wide and dark and starless, bearing down on her from above –

She was lucky to have survived. Lucky. That was what they called it when she fell from the sky with her feathers bloody and her wing twisted under her. That was what they called it when she healed weak and crooked and stiff. That was what they called it when she tried, again and again, to fly, only to fall back to earth each time, the moon a mocking smile above her, a million miles out of reach. Lucky.

The other birds looked down at her from above, from where they flew and swooped and played in the sun beams. They pointed her out to their fledglings and said:

“Look, children. Look at the little bird who cannot fly. She tried to fly to the stars and the owl got her. She didn’t stay hidden in her nest at night. Learn from her mistakes and never go flying at night.”

So, the little bird was stuck on the ground. Her wing was crooked, and her feathers were torn. She had tried to fly to the stars, where no bird had ever flown, and she had payed the price.

And yet, she couldn’t give up on her dream. She loved the stars even when she could not have them, even when the moon mocked her and the sky was out of reach, even when her love brought her pain. She loved the night even though it was dangerous. Perhaps even because it was dangerous.

So, the little bird waited till the moon was round and fat once more, and she sang the song she had always kept hidden inside. She sang of stars like diamonds, and of the moon round and welcoming like a nest, or conspiratorial and sly like a smile. She sang of the velvety, inky blackness that didn’t burn her skin or hurt her eyes like the sun did. The other birds woke from where they slept in their nests, and wondered what she was thinking, singing of these things that no bird had ever sung of, not caring if the owl heard her.

And the owl, perched on a branch on the other side of the forest, heard her song, and something deep in its cold, predatory mind sparked with curiosity. It cocked its head and listened.

The little bird sang until she ran out of breath. The silence when she stopped was like the stillness before the storm. Across the forest, the owl spread its wings and took to the night, angling her wings towards the source of the song.

And then a miracle occurred.

The stars hear the little bird’s song, and they listened. As distant and cold as they were, the stars were moved by the little bird’s plight. They decided that since she longed so fiercely for the stars, she would become one of them.

They called down to the little bird with the crooked wing, and said, “Fly up to us, and join us in the sky. We will make you one of us, the brightest star of all.”

“I can’t,” the little bird replied, “My wing is broken, and even if it weren’t, the owl would get me.”

“We’ll help you!” the stars promised. And so, they fashioned her a new set of wings made of starlight, and they sent them down to earth for the little bird. The little bird spread her new wings and took to the sky, flying higher and higher, faster than a moonbeam.

The owl saw her and took chase, claws opening and closing in anticipation of the kill. The little bird looked down and flew faster still. She was almost there, almost to the stars –

She was almost too slow. The owl was right behind her when she reached the sky and hid among the stars. It tried to follow her, wings pumping hard and breath clouding and sparkling in the thin, cold air at the edge of space. Eventually, the owl was forced to give up and dive back to earth, a scream of fear and anger trailing behind it. It had never been thwarted before, let alone by a small bird with a broken wing.

From then on, the little bird lived in the sky with the stars and the moon. In space, she could sing whenever she wanted, because there were no owls to hear her. The wings that the stars had given her let her fly far and wide through the cosmos, starlight trailing behind her like a cape. But no matter how far she wandered, she always returned to earth every seventy-five years to check on her home and the birds that lived there.

The humans who saw her streaking across the sky in a blaze of light called her a comet and named her after a human called Halley, but the birds know who she really is. They call her the star that flies, and they know that she was once a little bird with a broken wing and a dream. And when the owl looks up and sees her lighting up the night sky, it remembers its one and only defeat and cowers in fear in its nest for as long as she is overhead.

And so, when Halley’s comet makes the other stars look dim, the birds know that they are safe to fly and sing at night, for the owl never hunts when the star that flies is watching. They point her out to their fledglings and say:

“Look children. Look at the little bird who became a star. She tried and fell and tried again, and she never gave up even when she could not fly. Learn from her and never give up on your dreams.”