Wednesday, July 2, 2014

Dianna MacKinnon Henning: "Set Free"














When my husband caught the hummingbird
and freed it from the screened-in porch,
his big hands, a woven bird’s nest,
a few fingers opened into an escape hatch,

I held my breath as one does before the delicate—
that spot of bird, singular in its journey,
wings like small lead windows.

It seemed strange to see a six foot man
who could easily crush the body of such a small thing
release to air the hummingbird, who once in flight,
turned as if to say, I’ll remember this.




"Set Free" by Dianna MacKinnon Henning. Published online by Your Daily Poem, March 21, 2014. © Dianna MacKinnon Henning.

Art credit: "Newly-banded Hummingbird takes off!", photograph by Margy Terpstra/Hummer Haven UNLTD, published by Birds and Blooms (originally color).

 

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