This is Bird Note. I'm Darrymals Wilson.

Grief settles in the body like an overcast sky on a windless day.

Heavy, unmoving.

At least that's how it felt on the day of my cousin's funeral.

On that June morning in Camden, South Carolina, the world felt hushed, aside from my family's tears.

Our collective grief colored everything in lacklustre gray. Well, almost everything. Shortly after the procession began

escorting my cousins was final resting place. I spotted a flash of vermillion. A red-headed woodpecker appeared near yards away from me,

the first one I had ever seen with my own eyes,

or what bird is called a lifer.

Its vibrant colors were a bright spot on an otherwise dark day.

Later, while I walked in the woods on my uncle's property at twilight, an eastern

Whippoorwill, taut out from the trees, steadfast and distinct, right as dust thickened into

night. Another lifer, another extraordinary gift. I didn't expect to find

joy as I wandered in the wilderness that evening, but joy, as it turns out, appears before us in the

most unexpected places at unpredictable times. As I remember my cousin, I hold tightly to this message

from the birds I saw.

Joy does not wait. It simply arrives, even in the midst of sorrow.

For bird note, I'm Dara Miles Wilson.