If you’ve read my blog for a bit, you know I love birds.
It’s an inherited love.
Or maybe a contagious love.
Either way: I got it from my grandmother.
Some of my earliest memories are of sitting on her lap as she read to me, and one of the books was about birds and their nests. From shelves on her apartment walls, bird figurines looked over us like sentinels. Silent witnesses. “Ornaments,” she called them. One resembled a pair of robins. She lifted me up countless times to peer into their ceramic nest, to marvel at the baby bird inside:
This vintage 1960s figurine is exactly like Grandma’s. Her “ornament” went to someone else in the family but I found this one online a couple of weeks ago. It’s in perfect condition and now sits atop Grandma’s piano in my living room.
There’s another I hadn’t thought about in a while…until my recent sightings of bald eagles, to my great awe and consolation during a brief time of despair.
Grandma had an eagle ornament…whatever became of it?
I texted my aunt.
She has it. She told me that Grandma wrote on the underside: One of my favorites!
My aunt texted this photo. She said: The eagle is yours.
An unexpected, deeply meaningful gift. I am learning that the eagle comes out of the blue, when needed most. Even in my dreams. This past week I dreamed of taking a journey and high in the trees along the roadside were eagles’ nests; I could see white heads above the rims, peering down. Even in the dreamworld, I was awestruck. I woke feeling rested and strengthened. And watched over.
My granddaughters haven’t seen my bird nest ornament yet, and Grandma’s eagle is a way off still. But every spring, my girls stand beside me, marveling over the hummingbirds at the feeder. We watch Mama and Papa Bluebird darting in and out of the birdhouse with insects in their beaks, feeding hungry babies. I’ve held my granddaughters up to see real baby house finches in the nest on the wreath of my front door…which won’t happen this season, as the wreath has been removed. Micah learned to mimic me around age two, when I held her in my arms at the kitchen window; putting her tiny finger to her lips, she’d whisper: Shhh. Watch. Birds.
She is three now. She will remember.
Just as I do.
For a moment, I see Grandma’s smile, radiant as springtime sun. I feel her arms lifting me up for the wonder of seeing that baby bird in its ceramic nest, with its parents standing guard.
And I am quite sure I hear a faint rustling of wings, nearby.
*******
with thanks to Two Writing Teachers for the March Slice of Life Story Challenge
My fellow Spiritual Journey writers post on the first Thursday of each month. Our host for September, Patricia Franz, offered these bursts of thought for reflection: Life at the speed of grace. Grace is my shorthand for God. How will Grace find you?
To me, grace, like love, is a many-splendored thing. It has many facets, casting fiery rainbow-sparks like a diamond ring.
When Patricia says It’s my shorthand for God, I remember discovering my aunt’s spiral-topped notebook when I was a child. The pages were covered in curious swirls and curls, an otherworldly language, impossible code. I was awed by the way my aunt, a civil-service secretary, could interpret these runes into words which would become an official letter typed on behalf of the U.S. military. To this day I cannot read or write shorthand. In this way, grace is code written in the offices of Heaven, authored by God, signed and sealed with His unfathomable, unconditional love. It is the language of love. To be a true recipient of grace is to be an authorized and expected giver of it, in turn.
But what IS grace, aside from aesthetics: clean lines, beauty of movement, a blessing over food before we partake? One dictionary definition says it’s the unmerited favor of God, something echoed over and over in the New Testament. My favorite grace-verse is probably Romans 5:8: God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us (ESV).
I have a bracelet that bears this paraphrase: I loved you at your darkest.
Grace.
In preparation for a lesson I recently taught at church, I arrived at another understanding of grace. In the same epistle to the Romans, the Apostle Paul writes: For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned (12:3). In this message to the Roman community of believers, Paul expounds on the characteristics that (should) set them apart from the rest of the world. That opening phrase is what catches my attention: For by the grace given to me…suddenly a portion of the code becomes clear. Grace is more than unmerited favor writ in the blood of unconditional love. Grace is a force for living. A sustainable fuel for powering us throughout all of our days.
I can never write about grace anymore without thinking of Eugene Peterson and his paraphrased reflection of Christ’s words in Matthew 11:29: Learn the unforced rhythms of grace.
Which of these word holds the most transformational power?
unforced
rhythms grace
Learn.
For me, it’s learn. That is where I must begin. Grace begins with God. The unforced rhythms of grace are currents that have existed long before me and will continue long after me. Learn, as in learn to swim. Therein lies a unique freedom, being carried by that current and never being swept away by it. Grace seeps into one’s heart, becomes a beat in one’s blood, in one’s soul. A rhythm, a song, a dance. A unforced force for living.
Learn.
Of this, I will be forever a student. But all around me, every day there are reminders, endless grace-analogies making themselves known. During Hurricane Idalia last week, the hummingbirds never stopped coming to my window-feeders. The gusting wind and rain appeared to have no effect on these tiny creatures. Completely undeterred, the feisty hummers came for their nectar amid the storm, steady, straight, and sure, same as they do every day.
I have an entire bluebird family that appears, morning and evening, like clockwork, around their little log cabin birdhouse on the old grape arbor. When the birdhouse was on my dilapidated back deck the parents raised several broods in it. When I removed it for the deck to be torn down and rebuilt, the puzzled parents came searching for their home. It shattered my heart. I put the birdhouse on the arbor, not knowing what to expect. They found it immediately. The bluebird family followed it. They still lay claim to it, still operate from it. They are devout about it. I might add that there’s a little cross on the top of the birdhouse; my granddaughters call it the bird church. I might also add that it held during the hurricane…during several hurricanes, actually, including a few before it was moved.
I consider the makeshift birdbath my granddaughters and I built with an upturned trashcan lid and rocks. The solar-powered fountain kept spraying in the storm, even though there was no sun that I could see in the grayness…
For me, all of these echo unforced rhythms of grace.
Most every morning and afternoon since school has started again, on my drive to work, I’ve seen the great blue heron I love at its pond in the corner of picturesque little farm. I’d much rather be birdwatching and soaking up nature than playing around online, but I couldn’t resist a “what bird are you” quiz I came across online. I gave it a try. The results: You are a snowy egret.
That same morning, when passing the pond, I didn’t see the blue heron. Instead I saw a white egret in flight, reflected in the pond.
The very image of grace.
I am more amused than awed: If that egret represents me, I’d be the reflection of it. I cannot be the breathtaking, winged creature itself, skimming with perfect ease above the water. But somewhere in my being is an image of it.
And so it is with God, in whom all things connect, from whom all blessings flow.
Unforced rhythms of grace on the wing, in every breath, in the often-turbulent currents of life, a never-ending song, a ceaseless rising.
Funny how I’ve just now remembered a thing, during this writing: When my husband became a pastor many, many years ago, I was asked to sing my first solo at church. I was twenty-two. Scared and unsure, I tried my best. I fell dismally short of what I hoped for. But an elderly man, a woodcarver, made a gift for me to commemorate the occasion: a white egret on a little base. Underneath, he etched the title of the song: Amazing Grace.
Let me throw my wings wide to rest in and ride the currents, O Lord. Let me abide in the depths of your grace as a wanting but willing conduit.
Was there a childhood birthday when you woke up excited beyond description for what you hoped that day would bring? It was like that when I turned six. I couldn’t wait for my father to take me to the store where I’d pick out my first pet: a parakeet. I’d begged and begged for one. I was enchanted by birds then, and I am exponentially enchanted now, which is why I woke up so excited last Saturday.
It was to be a day filled with birds…more than I could even count, although I had to try.
World Migratory Bird Day, to be more precise, a global celebration occurring on the second Saturdays of May and October. As defined on the WMBD website: World Migratory Bird Day is an annual awareness-raising campaign highlighting the need for the conservation of migratory birds and their habitats. It has a global outreach and is an effective tool to help raise global awareness of the threats faced by migratory birds, their ecological importance, and the need for international cooperation to conserve them.
In the common interest of science, conservation, and celebration, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology invites bird lovers around the world to count all birds seen or heard on Global Big Day and to enter this data in official checklists.
And so I joined Team eBird with my friend and fellow blogger-poet, Kim Johnson. She’s in Georgia, I’m in North Carolina, but we are birds of the same feather in countless ways, equally excited for this bird-counting day.
It began when I woke up to birdsong early Saturday morning. Lately it’s been a mockingbird, which, I’ve learned, is usually a male singing while the female incubates eggs.
This day, however, the dawn singer was a robin.
I threw on my robe and went outside to start my count as the earth swelled with bird chorus.
Here’s what Merlin Sound ID (a Cornell Lab app on my phone) told me I was hearing out front and on my back deck:
There are also some regular bird friends whose voices aren’t in this mix. Back in the house, a fluttering at the window…
My male ruby-throated hummingbird visits periodically throughout the day, and this day was no different; he arrived early and was off in a flash. I added him to my list.
Then there are my eastern bluebirds.
They’re a mated pair which nested in a birdhouse on the deck before Easter, attempting to be as furtive as possible, until the first week of May when they went stark raving territorial. The female flew and flew at the kitchen bay window. Both of them became obsessed with cars in the driveway; one morning I watched the male killing a worm on top of my son’s car. I am still not sure what prompted the sudden change in behavior, but I suspect their babies fledged and flew, resulting in fierce protectiveness of the habitat. All I can say with certainty is that these two birds believe they reign over the kingdom of my yard.
Because they do.
His Majesty
Her Royal Highness, taking over the hummingbird feeder
Never fear, Bluebirds Dear; I added you both to the list. And you don’t know it yet but I bought a “snake” camera to check your nest in the birdhouse, to see what exactly is in there. More on that later…
Other birds awaited on this Global Big Day. Off to the lake I went, in hopes of seeing eagles.
I didn’t see any. But I did see two great blue herons, separately, standing still as statues, as elegiac as poetry, in all their strange and ancient beauty.
They remind me that birds are the last living dinosaurs.
One of the two great blue herons
Over at the dam, a giant nest is protected by government fencing and two fake owls, which don’t seem to bother the two nesting ospreys at all.
One of the two ospreys
After duly noting the ospreys, I made a note to self: Get a good digital camera ASAP. The zoom on the phone can only do so much.
The trip to the lake yielded over thirty species of birds. In addition to those I noted at home, Merlin Sound ID picked up scarlet and summer tanagers, pine warblers, a Swainson’s thrush, Eastern phoebes, brown-headed cowbirds, white-breasted nuthatches, Eastern wood pee-wees, red-bellied woodpeckers and downy woodpeckers, Eastern towhees, chimney swifts, ovenbirds, and the American goldfinch.
Then a huge bird fell straight down from the sky and landed in the brush few feet in front of me.
A red-shouldered hawk. With its beak it grabbed a little snake I’d have never seen otherwise. And then the hawk ran—yes, ran!—into the woods.
I added the hawk to my list as I headed back to the car, exhausted but elated with my bird inventory. I was pretty much done.
But the hawk wasn’t done with me yet.
A little farther down the wooded path, a sudden loud “screaming” of birds— an unmistakable warning of danger, as the hawk sailed by to land on a low pine branch.
I stood as still as I could, videoing that bird for over two minutes while he cocked his head, observing me (does he have a checklist, too?). Smaller birds clamored all around the whole time; some were quite near the hawk, almost like groupies. I couldn’t take my eyes off the hawk long enough to see exactly what the other birds were; Merlin later told me “robins.” Really? I have read that robins are the birds whose warnings make all others take cover but I have never heard them so loud, in such stereo sound. I’d already counted robins, fortunately…then just like that, the hawk took off and the wild screams followed right after him…Elvis has left the building.
Wild.
The red-shouldered hawk, celebrity of the day
Back at home in the evening my family gathered ’round to celebrate my birthday… even more bird-wonder in this day!
Books on birds and birding
Books to share with my granddaughters, ages seven and eighteen months
Finch earrings from my son
I settled down to bed that evening, counting my years, counting my birds, counting the many blessings and love in my life….all in all, the happiest of birddays.
I opened one of the new books, The Thing with Feathers: The Surprising Lives of Birds and What They Reveal About Being Human, to read the opening sentence:
Imagine what might happen if birds studied us.
Imagine? There’s no need to imagine...
I know without question that they do.
His Majesty, looking in the window
*******
with thanks to Two Writing Teachers for the weekly Slice of Life story writing challenge to Kim Johnson, for always inspiring me to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology for its amazing mission to all who help protect birds
and to birds, for all the awe and the lessons we need to learn about tending our Earth
When you select it, ‘Merlin’ listens and tells you which birds it hears.
I already know the beautiful songs of house finches, cardinals, and Carolina wrens. The low, mournful coo of doves. I know birds of the night by sound: the haunting, onomatopoetic call of the whippoorwill in summer, the hair-raising screech and who? who? who? of owls. What other wonders are hidden in the woods surrounding my home?
And so it was one damp, drab morning that I stepped out on the back deck with my phone and opened up the bird wizard (the name Merlin is too good).
First bird heard:
CAW! CAW! CAW!
The words American crow popped up in the app.
Thanks, Merlin. That’s only the easiest bird sound in the world. I knew it as a little kid watching Kornfield Kounty in Hee Haw.
Globally speaking, however: Is there a bird more steeped in superstition, legend, and lore? Or with more conflicted symbolism?
Harbinger of death and sickness. Psychopomp, spiritual guide for the human soul. A sign of transformation, balance, wisdom, confidence, trickery… crows are even said to carry a person’s prayers to heaven.
They are scavengers but they cannot tear flesh open with their own beaks and have to wait for some other toothed predator to start the process; they’ve been known to lead wolves or other hunters to prey. Crows don’t dine exclusively on meat; they’ll eat “almost anything,” researchers say.
Scientists say that crows have big brains and are aware of their own thoughts. In Norse mythology, two crows (or ravens, depending on the source) whose names meant Thought and Memory rode the shoulders of Odin. Crows act with deliberation. They are keen observers. They use tools like sticks and shells when needed to get their food. They learn to recognize human faces and have been known to leave gifts such as pebbles or pretty shards of broken pottery as a thank you for humans who have fed them…
CAW! CAW! CAW!
Crows also prey on songbirds…
There’s Papa House Finch singing like Tevye on the roof of my house while Mama Finch is nestled on little blue eggs so perfectly hidden in the wreath on my front door…
Don’t even think about it, Crows. The finches are mine.
Yet.
In all my dreams about birds—for there’ve been many—I’ve not seen finches. Eagles, peacocks, owls, and whippoorwills (I think) have appeared.
And one bright-eyed crow, sitting in the gravel beside a car, with a bright green stone or ball, waiting to give it to me.
What does it mean?? That is the question…
CAW! CAW! CAW!
I feel pretty sure about this one thing: If a crow offers you a gift…take it.
One more bit of food for thought: The name Merlin has a controversial origin history itself… possibly derived from French merle, which means blackbird.
*******
with thanks to two fellow Slicers in the Two Writing Teachers community: Kim Johnson, for pointing me to the Great Backyard Bird Count, and Ms. Chiubooka (Cindy), for recently wondering what my take on crows would be.
We’re all in the daily Slice of Life Story Challenge together.
–with thanks to Barb Edler for the Open Write inspiration on Ethical ELA. Barb invited poets to speak directly to a subject, perhaps a person from the past or present, a beloved or loathed object, or even a dream, frustration, or desire.
Refuge
In the dead of winter in the dark of night in the starlit silence you come
to sleep in the old twig-vine wreath on the front door
tiny warm presence of which I’d be unaware if not for the pull of the stars
the frigid bite of the night is worth the sight if only for a moment
so I open the door
soft sudden flutter wings taking flight in the cold cold night
oh little bird that I cannot see you cannot know how your presence comforts me
that in this barren season before the time of nesting you find your place of resting
upon my door
little winged creature of first blessing
*******
Note: Sea creatures and birds were the first living things blessed by God, Genesis 1:22.
Said wreath. When I woke before dawn, remembering there’s a comet to be observed, I bundled up to try for a view from the front porch. The little unseen bird flew out of the wreath as I opened the door. There is no nest; I am not sure where the bird tucks in but the idea of it sleeping against the safety of my door in winter makes a metaphor of immense comfort to me. I can’t determine if it’s a house finch (they build nests in my wreaths each spring) or a Carolina wren, tiny bird with a big, gorgeous song. In the darkness I can only hear small wings beating for a split second as it takes flight. Whatever it is… it is welcome.
Winter morning, below freezing, ground covered with thick layer of frost like unto snow. Oyster-gray sky streaked with clouds aflame with sunrise. Breathtaking colors. I drive to work, looking for magisterial hawks perched on power lines. None to be seen. At the corner where the patch of woods has been cleared, old tobacco barns are melting into the stubble, overlaid with a thin veneer of crystal. So beautiful, I say aloud. Something pure remains in the devastation. I cannot think of what. I drive on, pondering destruction and human hunger for it.
In the new rose-light little birds skitter up from the wood-edged fields. What type of birds they are, I cannot determine, just upward movement and wings. A strange line plays in my head: This day your life will be required of you. I suppose it’s born of constant murder in the news and too much reading, this very morning the strange coincidence of Diana, Princess of Wales, attending the funeral of Princess Grace of Monaco, who died from injuries sustained in a car crash. Did the struggling Diana sense any foreshadowing?
Why am I even thinking of these things during such a glorious dawn?
A shape swoops from the right, directly in the path of my car…surely a bird. I hear no thunk. I see no skittering escape in my rearview mirror.
The bird—if in fact it was—must be caught in the grille of my car. This happened once, long ago, when I was driving a different vehicle: I discovered a dead cardinal hanging partway under the car. Why, why do they fly so low?
I will have to stop and check. There’s nowhere to pull over on these winding backroads frequented by too-fast drivers and farm equipment.
There’s a tiny church tucked in the woods up ahead, past the intersection. Steep driveway, deserted area, but I have to get out and look.
Nothing ensnared on the wide chrome grille of my old car. Beneath the grille, however, are unscreened compartments and there, on the dark, recessed shelf, is a bird.
Alive and moving around. Gray, orange, and cloud-white, like the morning.
Oh, bird.
I take off my heavy black cardigan, wrap it around my hands, and reach in.
Gently, gently… then a soft, warm weight is in my sweatered hands. I make sure to cover its wings to avoid panicked and possibly injurious flapping. Its head is gray. Small gray beak opens and closes without a sound. Its eye, turned toward me, has a faint purplish hue, slightly reminiscent of my pet parakeet when I was six. The gray back and pale-orange coloring on the breast had me thinking robin, but now I can see it’s not. I don’t know what kind of bird this is.
Oh, little bird. I am sorry. As if my speaking will help, somehow.
I cannot stand here gawking at it. The creature has survived the trauma of my car; I don’t want it to die from terror of me.
I think of being in the hands of God.
Please don’t let it die, I pray. Is this a selfish prayer? I don’t know how badly the bird is damaged.
And what am I going to do with it now.
The woods…I skim for a sheltered spot. I step in the leaves and a sudden sound startles me: a rabbit goes skittering away, its big white cottontail bobbing against the sepia scenery. I had no idea it was there. What else is here that I cannot see—? I am shivering. I find a small ridge of leaves and pine straw by a bit of barren brush and there I lay the bird.
The bird turns itself from side to breast, facedown. There’s a bit of white edging on its tail feathers. I wish for to something cover it. The morning is so cold. My sweater might entangle its legs; scraping pine straw over it might alarm it.
I will go. I will not stay to see the outcome. It will recover, or it won’t. I recall the woodpecker that flew smack into the glass wall of the school where I work; it landed on its back in the flowerbed mulch and lay so still I was sure its neck was broken. Within a moment, it managed to flip itself right side up, ruffled its feathers, and flew off—zip!—as if nothing had happened. The robin I extricated from the grille of my sister-in-law’s car, having traveled miles down the interstate at 70+ mph, hopped around my backyard for a day before it flew away. Birds are hardier than they look…at least robins and woodpeckers are.
Still.
Should this pretty little bird die or recoup…it will be in its own natural setting.
In the hands of God. Not a sparrow will fall to the ground apart from the Father...
It is hard, yes, to leave it there and walk away. But I have done so before. With people whom I loved very much.
It is Yours.
Back in the car, I circle the tiny church named for St. John, heading on toward crystal-coated fields and misty-mirror ponds and the work that lies ahead. The little bird will never know that I will remember it, that it’s now part of me, stuck to my soul as long as I live. I know it and that is enough on this cold, fiery-sky morning, orange and gray, breathtaking glory tinged with, but not diminished by, loss.
“If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost part of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me.” —Psalm 139:9-10 (my favorite of the Psalms).This is the view leaving my neighborhood.
As best I can determine: My unexpected passenger was a female eastern bluebird.
Winter mornings dawn in gray monochrome before the sun bursts on the scene like a passionate artist with its gilded palette
Driving to work in this gray in-betweenness I note the doves always sitting on the power lines like heralds their plump bodies of soft sandy colors framed by the oyster sky
reminding me: look for the peace this day live as peacefully as possible this day
Then, in the strange way of life as I drive home weary and worn the golden part of the day nearly spent what should I see on other power lines?
Hawks big and breathtaking still as statues painted in shades of rust
They might remind some people of raw bloodthirstiness or predatory fierceness but their beauty fills me with such awe that it’s all I can do to keep my eyes on the road driving home
as I think about how my winter days are bookended by birds and how there’s something inherently sacred and profoundly satisfying in that.
(One of these days, when I can stop the car safely, I am going to get my own photos of my hawks…)
******* with thanks to Ruth at SOS-Sharing Our Stories: Magic in a Blog for today’s inspiration to write: “You are invited to linger in your winter memories, reach deep and pick a golden moment to share.”
An offering for the Spiritual Journey group, comprised of faithful friends who gather on the first Thursday of each month. Today’s theme is “all things new.”
Spring arrives, clad in rich new vestments of green. Every day, more of the color ripples across the landscape. Here in the central part of North Carolina the Bradford pears have already exchanged their ethereal veil-clouds of wedding lace blossoms for something more matronly and verdant. A whirlwind ceremony, that five-minute flowering of pear.
The birds began preparing back in winter. Flashes of electric blue on my back deck; a brilliant bluebird, dropping by like a friendly neighbor. Darts of fiery red across the road while I’m driving; cardinals, making me stress over potentially ensnaring them in the grille (why DO they fly so low?). Today, a darling brown Carolina wren on my back deck—clearly doing Deacon of the Week rotation with the bluebird—singing its heart out, full-throated, unrestrained, magnificent. How can such a small bird have such a big voice? Bocelli can’t hold a candle to you, Little Wren. From the pines and budding hardwoods, bird choirs swell, as in the song “The King is Coming”:
Regal robes are now unfolding, Heaven’s grandstand’s all in place, Heaven’s choir now assembled, Start to sing “Amazing Grace!”
All in earthly bird language, naturally… but no less celestial.
All but the finches, that is.
For several consecutive years a finch family has built a nest on my from door wreath and raised generations of little broods. I’d find a total of three baby-blue eggs in the nest, sometimes four, laid precisely between seven and eight o’clock every morning. My family has been treated to an insider’s view of the whole process, from nest-building to egg-laying to the hatching of tiny pink things so frail and helpless that a person might think they can’t possibly manage to stay alive; yet in no time they’re fledglings working on flying lessons. We’ve even had a batch of babies in the spring and another in summer; that makes for a long time of roping off my front-door bird sanctuary.
Then, with the advent of COVID-19 last March, a curious thing occurred. As the human world reeled, and became strapped in the strange straitjacket of pandemic, as businesses shut down, as hospitals and mortuaries overflowed, spring came anyway. Nature, in fact, outdid herself with resplendent finery. The finches came to build their nest as always and this little act of constancy lifted my flagging spirits: At least there will be baby birds to watch while we are all under stay-at-home orders.
But there were no eggs last spring. The nest remained empty all season. The finches… they vanished. No warning, just—poof!—gone. I didn’t see when, how, or why.
After a while, bereft, I quit looking for them.
I didn’t take the wreath down until late fall.
I saved the little unused nest.
I didn’t have the heart to throw away such a labor of love (you can say instinct all you want but the perfect craftsmanship of nests amazes me).
With the return of March, I waited for the finches to join the rest of the avian throng having revival beyond my windows. Every day I looked.
Nothing.
Nothing.
Nothing.
Then, day before yesterday…on the top of the wreath, one lone strand of grass, lying in a telltale curve…could it be, could it be…?
And yesterday…
“THEY’RE BACK! THEY’RE BACK! COME SEE!”
My family humored me with only a slight rolling of eyes…my granddaughter, at least, seemed interested. She made my son hold her up high for a better, bird’s-eye view.
I marveled at the greenness of the nest. Is it just me, or is this how they always look? This green, this fresh? I do not think so. No, they have never been so green before.
And today…
Almost complete. Look at that leafy lining, so carefully placed.
By Easter—dare I hope?—we might have an egg.
A tiny, age-old symbol of rebirth and resurrection.
I marvel at this fresh greenery, this new grass, this preparation for new life, the hope that’s in it. If not for the birds, then for me. Especially after the year that’s passed, marked by so much bleakness and loss, down to the former little nest that contained no life.
I recall the promise of Christ: one day there will be no more death, mourning, crying, or pain. Behold, I am making all things new (Revelation 21:4-5, ESV).
Every spring hints at it. My personal winged messengers, harbingers of blessed assurance.
A little foretaste of glory divine.
Hymns of the heart. I step outside, away from the constraints of the house, watching the two finches take flight, zigzagging skyward, sunlight gleaming on their sandy backs, calling, calling, calling, how sweet the sound.
I come to the sanctuary in the cool of the day to behold these moments of Earth’s remembering, an altar call where I respond, walking the greening aisle just as I am to a fanfare of wingbeats and music-making. Holy holy holy, I surrender all in wordless doxology on the returning. Let all things their Creator bless, with ancient morningsong, yet ever new.
*******
Update, Thursday evening… first egg! Holy Week blessings to all.
and also shared with the writing community on SOS – Sharing Our Stories: Magic in a Blog, in response to the open invitation to write around the many meanings of “spring.”
lit bits and pieces 