{"id":8491,"date":"2021-10-31T14:25:14","date_gmt":"2021-10-31T20:25:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/?page_id=8491"},"modified":"2021-10-31T15:25:47","modified_gmt":"2021-10-31T21:25:47","slug":"the-songbird-thing","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/?page_id=8491","title":{"rendered":"The Songbird Thing"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size\"><strong>L. Breneman<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We knew we were living in a simulation when the songbird thing happened. One moment the songbirds and their dawn chorus, the next moment song squirrels instead. Bushy-tailed mammals standing upright in the trees, trilling to welcome the sun. Same idea, different animal.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The next day there was a giant door ajar in the sky, an invitation. The Secretary General ordered a squad of drones sent through.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>All the video showed was purple sky, lavender sand, and pale creatures resembling three-legged brains moving about like ants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These were the creators? We wanted to be more impressed.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And what were we supposed to do? Ask for accommodations and guarantees? Demand the return of the songbirds? Anyway, the songbird thing was likely just a small demonstration. What was next? Were people going to be replaced too? Or would the creators finally eliminate war and poverty?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Besides the creators, it was only the comedians who saw the humor.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>You call that Earth 2.0? Song squirrels? Give us a break.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n&nbsp;\n\n\n\n<hr\/>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>L. BRENEMAN\u00a0<\/strong>lives in Seattle. Breneman&#8217;s poetry, creative nonfiction, and stories have appeared in\u00a0<em>Poetry Northwest, Ascent, Litro, Burrow Press Review, Del Sol Review<\/em>, and other venues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>L. Breneman We knew we were living in a simulation when the songbird thing happened. One moment the songbirds and their dawn chorus, the next moment song squirrels instead. Bushy-tailed mammals standing upright in the trees, trilling to welcome the &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/?page_id=8491\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":8485,"menu_order":6,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-8491","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/P15duy-2cX","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/8491","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8491"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/8491\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8494,"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/8491\/revisions\/8494"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/8485"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}