Fish out of Water

Once upon a time, there was a fish who swam in the sea. One day, the birds flew overhead and whispered to him. Their voices fell through the sky and down into the water like gold and silver coins. They plunged into the water and attracted this fish until he listened to their words.

“Come up out of the water,” the birds said, “You don’t know what you are missing. The grass sways in the wind and the leaves on the trees whisper secrets you will never understand from the water.”

The fish listened. He jumped out of the water at the bidding of the birds and landed on the sand next to his lake. There, he flipped his tail and fins and struggled in the dirt, trying to swim through the new substance surrounding him. He looked up to the birds.

“What is this?” he asked, “Why can’t I swim? Why aren’t my gills filling with water? Why do I feel like I’m dying?”

“Don’t worry,” said the birds, “You only have to get used to it. Eat these seeds. We eat them, and they cause us to be strong enough to swim through the sky. Look!”

The birds flipped through the air to prove their point before flitting off to bring seeds. Soon, the fish had a pile of seeds and he began to eat.

“These don’t help at all,” said the fish, “They only get stuck in my throat and give me pains in my stomach.”

The birds brought more things to the fish. They built a nest around him and taught him to make himself comfortable in it. They covered him with the softest feathers, and built a mud and stick nest around him.

“This will help you,” they said, “Just rest in your wonderful nest until your feathers grown in. Then, we will teach you to fly.”

But the fish got worse. His scales grew dry and his colors turned grey. The birds sent for the butterfly doctors and they flitted above him, trying to cure him.

“Bring lotions. Bring oils. Pour this nectar down his throat.”

But everything they did only made him worse.

Finally, the fish remembered that he could breathe in the water. He could swim there and have a home there without relying on the butterfly doctors and the birds. So he went back the way he had come and swam away through the sea.