Hummingbird-Heart
Greedy bird, you are not more exasperating
Than a certain small person of preference—
You who have formed the alarming habit
Of drinking only out of the Audubon Society’s
Artfully camouflaged feeding-tube
Sugar and water mixed in precise proportions.
Shy, fascinating creature—
Shrilling to me impatiently to move away
Whenever I loom too near for your electric
Shape to dart down to flower level unafraid—
How was I to know you would prove
So fond of refined cane sugar as to make me
Fill your tube two and even three times a day?
How was I to know, amiable pest,
That you would take whatever I have to give—
Importunate, insatiable—
With never a thought of sharing your exquisite small
Self for more than the space contained
Between the opening and shutting of an eye?
John Moffitt, Escape of the Leopard (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1974), 18.
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