The Message of Hummingbirds

Her mother dearly loves her hummingbirds.
For years she’s maintained a dozen feeders
around her country home. Mere words
can’t capture the joy those aerial speeders

elicit in her every day. But now her mother
lies dying. “Who will feed all my hummers?”
her mother frets. “I hope they can find another
who will feed them as I have all these summers.”

She takes her mother’s hand. “I will take
care of your hummingbirds. It'll be a bond
between us of love and honor. I will make
my city yard their home, if they'll respond.”

Her mother smiles at her…then she is gone.
The winter months and her grief slowly fade.
In late April a hummingbird appears one dawn
outside her window, reminding her she had made

the promise to her mother. She buys and mounts
a feeder, even though she’s never before seen
any hummingbirds in her yard. Soon she counts
four … now even more … an unbelievable scene!

All summer she has forty or more hummingbirds
filling her yard at her dozen feeders. In her heart
she knows her mother understood her last words,
and she takes much comfort in having done her part.

The hummers stay a daily reminder of her love
for her mother and make her feel still somehow
connected with her. Peace of mind undreamed of
before the birds arrived has settled over her now.

Comes September, and her world is shattered late
one night with a phone call. Her teenage daughter
has been in a car wreck; in an unconscious state
she lies in the hospital. The news, like frigid water,

chills her to the marrow, sending her mind into a spin.
Her daughter may have suffered brain damage. Should
she awaken, the doctors will be able to determine then.
For four days and nights she has stayed and withstood

the interminable worrying by her daughter’s side.
Her husband convinces her to go home for a few
hours of sleep, a shower, and to take time to provide
refills for her hummingbird feeders, which are overdue.

She showers, then falls asleep under the inviting covers.
At dawn the next morning, as emerging sunlight shows
the yard, a solid white hummingbird comes and hovers
outside the window. Suddenly she knows … she just knows!

The tiny white bird looks her eye to eye in such a way
that she knows. The phone rings. “She will be all right.
She is now awake and alert,” she hears her husband say.
She cries as the hummingbird flies straight up, out of sight.


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