Poems (Lambert)/The Humming-bird
THE HUMMING-BIRD.
I ENTERED my parlor one bright summer morn,My vases with flowers, sweet flowers to adorn.In arranging the curtains, there fell on my headA dear little humming-bird, dead—quite dead!
I pressed the poor darling so close to my heart,And thought that I felt a slight flutter, a start!Could I but restore it to life, how divine,How sweet, how delicious a joy would be mine!
I rushed to the garden and placed its long mouthIn the sweet honey-suckle which blooms in the South;I saw that the humming-bird drew a long breath,As it tasted the nectar that saved it from death!
The minutes flew past, yet I staid in the bower,And moved my poor birdling from flower to flower;At last, with a sweet strain of grateful heart's praise,It flew upward, far upward, beyond my eyes' gaze.
Thus when you, dear children, are dying in sin—When all is a void and an aching within—Drink deep of the nectar of God's holy love,And your souls will be wafted to mansions above.