Carolina Wren : Morning’s Joyful Prayer

This is a Carolina Wren. Each morning, first thing, its impossibly loud song bursts out of its tiny little body. I typically start my walks before sunup. It’s silent then, but it’s an expectant silence, saving room for the music about to start. The Wren is always the first voice I hear. A whole chorus joins right after: other birds singing, wing flaps close overhead, scratches in leaf piles digging up bugs. It’s like the Wren’s song breaks the surface tension, and everything else can burst through afterwards.

My day starts like the Wren’s. Dark. Expectant. For a critical few moments, I stay in bed. More softly, but no less emphatically, I start my every morning singing Modeh Ani. This so-simple song acknowledges the so-profound gift we are given each morning - a restored soul, entrusted to us by our Creator. My first expression of the day is equal parts thanks and promised commitment, and like the Wren’s song, opens up the gates for all the goodness to follow.

No one (yet) knows what the Wren is saying. Scholars have proposed various theories about territoriality, feeding, mating, etc. Maybe it’s even more fundamental than those. What if the Wren is simply singing, “Hineini!” - “Here I am.” I won’t strain to argue that the Wren is praying like we do, but to say that all creatures - in their own way - have been created by HaShem and acknowledge their own presence in creation, that I won’t contest. That gratitude is an inherent component of every Divinely-created soul, whether in a man or a bird, that I can believe.