*

I parked the car near the tennis courts and hopped the sanctuary’s fence in the woods. The birds, apart from the owls, were asleep or resting. The owner of the place, I found, had finished constructing the bald eagle’s perch, but the bird remained on the ground, resting in the dirt with its eyes closed and its single leg curled underneath its body. Its feathers were dull and thin, and its head was more pink than stark white.

Cutting through the wired cage, I thought: At what point do you just end it? I stepped through the section I had cut in the cage and stood there beside the bird. Even with the noise and my presence, it remained stationary and unaware, and I thought: At what point do you intervene? At what point do you allow this bird—hardly a bald eagle now—its death? I put the burlap sack over the bird, and while I was tying up the sack so it couldn’t escape, I thought about asphalt on an otherwise serene beach.

I took the sacked bald eagle to the car and left. When I pulled into Captain Gill’s, it started to stir.

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