Perched in summer light,
the blue jay stands watch.

A sentinel in feathers,
bold as the promise made
two hundred fifty years ago.

Its crest lifts like a banner,
its colors echoing a nation
still learning, still striving,
still singing its declaration
into the open air.

In that bright eye
is the same spark
that once leapt from quill to parchment.

A reminder that freedom
is not only a date in history,
but a living thing
that perches among us still.

****************

On this Day in American History: July 2nd, 1776

The "Lee Resolution" was adopted by 12 of the 13 colonies. New York did not vote on July 2 because its delegates were waiting for instructions from Albany, and the state had not yet decided whether to support or oppose independence. Immediately after the 12-colony July 2nd vote, Congress began to consider how to write the Declaration of Independence. Congress made some alterations and deletions to it on July 2, 3, and the morning of the 4th.

The original "Lee Resolution", proposed by Richard Henry Lee on June 7, 1776, was a formal assertion passed by the Second Continental Congress declaring that the Thirteen Colonies were "free and independent States; separate from the British Empire. July 2nd was then the start of the colonies making this concept a formal document.