A few weeks ago, I hung a pot of begonias from the front-porch lintel. Sometimes I would water it in place, and sometimes, if rain was in the offing, I would set it out upon the lawn, that it might be refreshed from the gentle drops of heaven, unmediated by watering-can.
Beginning last week, whenever I would come out the front door, there would be a flurry of motion and a bursty blur, coming from the general direction of the begonias. Like any creature of the forest, I was alarmed at first, but soon came to realize that it was a bird, making a hasty exit.
My first thought -- not really a thought, more like a daydream -- was appallingly unscientific: that this bird came because she liked the flowers. But she’s not a hummingbird, and regular birds don’t do nectar. Plus she is here constantly, far too often for a nectar fix from this one little planting, when the cul-de-sac is bursting with gardens on every hand. Then it dawned on me: This bird is guter Hoffnung, and she has built a nest.
The world o’erturned. No more dare I slosh the pot with water, drenching the eventual nestlings, nor set it out upon the lawn -- among the crafty cats. But evicting her is out of the question. Her choice, which had seemed quirky at first, in fact is splendid: hung high above ground-based predators, and out of reach from any wood-climbing ones; densely protected by the tufts of flowers from prying eyes.
And so it is to be. She still takes fright -- takes flight -- when I emerge in all my hugeness from the house. (Fair enough; though I would admire her the more, if she deems her clutch in peril, were she to stay and fight.) But in time, and with the prayers of St. Francis, she may come to see me rather as a distant, benevolent protector. For I have never so much as peered between the leaves, to spy what might lie there. ‘Twould not be decent; a gentleman simply does not do such things. So I shall come and go, in silence and reverence; and she shall sit and brood; and together we shall praise our Maker.
No comments:
Post a Comment