Doren Robbins

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Hummingbird

How did he find me here
when I was watering
the fire blossoms?
Fluttering something
out of his chest feathers,
he crapped on an apricot
just below him, and I saw
the shore of white breast trim,
I saw the iridescent plum
above the white barbs.
That’s what he flashed out of
the apricot leaves when
the scrub jays came into
the yard, then he aimed
his beak toward them.
I think it was the motor sound
of his wings and his flying speed
that made them streak back to
the telephone wire.
No fight in those confused jays.
He likes the same apricot branch
every time. He comes here
for the fire blossoms,
a kind of red honeysuckle,
the juice he can't live without,
the color origin
that marks him between his
heart and his throat.
Sometimes his mate flies after
him and they disappear
way up into the secreting
pine. He returns alone.
Must be he comes here to rest.
He works for hours for his
abundance and then just
burns it up flying with her,
flying into the fire juice and back.
Him I like the best, him,
hovering, before dipping
all the way in, with wings'
so wild with motion
the untouched orange blossoms
float backward while he's there.

Copyright (C) Doren Robbins, 2006. All rights reserved.