The swallow stood, 12 cm tall. It stood, tall, proud, and erect. Its feathers ruffled up, shining in all its wondrous dark red glory. Brilliant black beady eyes shone from beneath the beautiful caress of feathers. Intellect, sharp, and quick-witted, the swallow sprang from one end to the other of the cage that held him in.

The cage slumped, sitting there, fat and ugly. The metal bars which joined the top of the cage to the bottom of the cage, was black with rust. It looked tired and weakened, as though the top of the cage seemed too heavy to carry. The cage, shrouded by the dark shadows surrounding its shady self, was, interestingly, rather illuminated. Its form could be seen through the foggy fingers of the mist creeping slowly. Probably because those glorious rays were emitting from the beautiful bird that the ugly cage had kept within its dark cresses. And well, the dark couldn't possibly beat the light.

Possibly the swallow longed to get out of its black prison, but it was so heavily caged in, so tightly, by that dreadful ivory metal freak, that it could not escape. Hence, the swallow, a jail-bird indeed, sat in its cage, and thought the whole cage was its world and its one and only. He perched himself on that single piece of wood, placed carelessly in the disgusting black prison, and sang his heart out, day after day after day, his voice full of happiness and joy.

The black charred cage knew that it held a prized swallow within itself. It felt inferior, it felt small. The bird was definitely superior to the stinking cage, and it felt stupid at holding back such a beautiful bird, when the bird could have flown free into the sky, and found its own true happiness.

For, as the cage knew, prized birds should never be kept in ugly cages.
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