The Buzzard Man
There was once a poor farmer's wife who had a lazy-bag-of-bones for a husband. Every morning it was the same old story. While she was a- hustling and a- bustling around the farmyard, he'd be fast asleep in bed. His snoring made the whole house shake until the pots and pans toppled out of the cupboards and the pictures fell off the walls.
The only way to wake him was to empty a bucket of water over his head. Then the wife would stuff him into his clothes and kick him down the stairs. It was all he could do to gobble down his porridge before he was shoved out of the door to tumble head-over-heels down the garden path. When he came to a stop, he'd look around at all the work needing to be done on the farm. Then he'd sigh and shrug his shoulders, lie down by the rhubarb patch and go to sleep until supper time.
The cows were never milked nor the eggs collected; the seeds were never sown nor the crops harvested, unless it was by the poor old wife. The husband only lifted a finger to pick his nose or to scratch his pants. That is how it had been for years. But from today, things would be different around the farm.
The morning started very strangely indeed. The wife milked the chickens and collected the eggs from the cows. She was so flustered that when she came in to the house she pushed the husband out of the door with a sharper shove than ever. By the time he'd tumbled to a stop he was so battered and bruised he couldn't lie down. It was then he looked up and saw a great buzzard circling above.
The husband shouted up to it,
“Lucky you, drifting about in the airy-fairy sky up there! You don't know what
it's like being a human; tramping on the hard earth and having a scold for a
wife. It's a simple life being a bird. All you do is flap your wings about a bit and
glide around taking it easy. You should come down here and find out what it's
like being a man who walks until his legs ache and works until his arms drop
off.”
Well with that, the buzzard swooped down and perched on the fence post next to him and said,
“Alright, let's swap around.”
“How are we going to do that?” asked the man.
“Easy,” said the buzzard, “you give me your clothes and you can have my
feathers.”
“What! Just like that?” said the man.
“Yes, just like that!” said the bird.
So, the two changed places. The man became a buzzard and the buzzard became a
man.
“How do I find my food?” asked the The Buzzard Who Had Been A Man.
“Oh, it's easy,” said The Man Who Had Been A Buzzard, “when you're up in the
sky looking down from on high, you'll be able to see the scent of a dead
creature coming from its carcass. Buzzards can see much better than humans. To
our eyes, the smell rises like a kind of smoke.
“I don't like mice,” said The Buzzard Who Had Been A Man.
“If it's a dead rabbit, the smoke is grey and light.”
“I don't mind rabbit,” he replied.
“If it's a dead deer, the smoke is black and strong.”
“I do like deer,” the other smiled.
Then, The Buzzard Who Had Been A Man flapped his wings and flew up into the sky and The Man Who Had Been A Buzzard walked home to the wife.
When he got to the house he told the wife to sit down while he made them supper. In the morning he milked the cows and brought her breakfast in bed. Later that day, he tidied up the farmyard and the vegetable plot and put all the brambles and old rubbish into a big heap. Then he called to the wife to show her all the work he'd done. She watched as he struck a match and set fire to the pile. As the bonfire blazed a great spiral of black smoke rose up.
Suddenly, a buzzard swooped down through the smoke, plunged into the fire and was burnt to a cinder.
The wife gasped,
“Did you see that bird drop into the bonfire? What was it thinking of?”
“What a birdbrain,” said The Man Who Had Been A Buzzard. “Let's go indoors
and you can put your feet up while I make us a nice cup of tea.”
A few weeks later, when the wife went to the market, a neighbour came up to her and
said,
“What's got into your husband? Everybody's talking about him. He's changed.”
“What do you mean?” enquired the wife.
“Well, he's become hard working and very polite to everyone nowadays it's true,
but…”
“But what?” said the wife.
“Haven't you noticed?” said her neighbour, “when he thinks no-one's watching
he starts rubbing his shoulders with his nose as if he's preening himself. And
what about those little feathers stuck to his clothes?
And what's happened to his nose? It's not the same one he had before. Now it's
hooked and beaky. And he's got a strange smell to him. How can you put up
with it?
I was walking past your place the other day and I saw him trying to balance on
a fence post.
Last night, my Tom saw him up on the roof by the chimney pot making strange
noises and flapping his arms about as if he was trying to fly!
People are talking. They say he's not the man he was. He's acting like a bird.
He's not a proper human. They say your husband is a Buzzard Man.”
“You hold your tongue,” said the wife. “I'd rather have someone who works
hard and cares for me, than live with that lazy-bag-of-bones I had before.
I don't care if he is a Buzzard Man. I like him just the way he is”
And with that she stomped away to buy a couple of rabbits from the butcher's stall. She put them in her basket and made her way back home to prepare the supper.
That evening they sat at the kitchen table enjoying their meal. Her stew was delicious: rabbit braised in red wine with apricots and shallots. But her husband didn't like fussy food. He preferred his meat red and raw.
And as far as I know, unless you can tell me otherwise, they both lived very happily ever after.
©Clive PiG
Drawings by Chris Brooks
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