Afternoon Communion

I had a visitor in my classroom the other day. She, unknowingly, flew into a storm of cacophony and swarms of students swatting at her. She found a safe place to land and made her way over to my desk where she climbed onto a note pad and passed the time grooming herself and studying me with quiet curiosity. I was able to release her onto a Texas Sage bush right outside my classroom window.

'Tis no small thing to befriend a bee

when she finds a quiet reverie

in a patch of sunlight by my hand,

a gift of pleasant company

~

A simple thing that seems quite grand

to rest here, making no loud demands.

She takes her ease, without a care,

in this bright and loud and foreign land.

~

For this small friend I think it rare

to choose this hush we briefly share,

to pause her frantic, buzzing flight,

and borrow stillness like a prayer.

~

O little wingéd, gentle sprite,

with honeyed manners--so polite--

You beg no gift I must requite;

We've lingered here in shared delight,

and so we part, in shared delight.