The Mouse that Dreamed of Flying

There once lived a mouse that looked up to the big blue sky above, and yearned to fly. Butterflies and birds only had to spread their wings and fly away. What would the world look like? There must be a way.

The mouse gathered fallen feathers from the birds, and tied them to his arms, using spider silk he collected.

Everyday, the mouse would climb up the trees that bordered the field, and would jump from the highest branches he could reach. The mice of the field would laugh at him, jesting at the impossibility of a flying mouse. The mouse continued jumping, but he never even once glided on the breeze.

Eventually, his body began to ache. His legs were sore and bruised from constantly falling, his arms exhausted and limp. More and more, the mouse could not climb the trees, nor could he flap his arms in vain flight.

And then, one day, he died.

The mice laughed. “What an idiot!”, they said. Of course this would happen. Many jokes were made about the mouse. Those jokes later then became stories. Then those stories turned into myths. Eventually, these myths turned into common lore, passed down from generation to generation.

Now, every mouse knows the tale of the Flying Mouse. Mothers will tell their children to look up at the sky, for even with its hawks and owls, there is a mouse who flies with the wind under his wings.