These sparrows reminded me of my mom when I was growing up and her fondness for sparrows. With my father the baker as food supply, my mom would, all throughout the winter months, while the snow covered the ground, feed the sparrows a good plateful of bread each day that she, or one of us, had broken into pieces and then thrown down the front step to the waiting birds. This generous gift of white bread, in the days before white bread became suspect, kept the birds seemingly happy and alive through the sometimes harsh winter months in Southern Alberta. I like to think they sat in some nook overnight thinking hopefully about Tina’s white bread breakfast for homeless birds.
My mom was pretty committed to these little creatures and they seemed grateful for the generosity of shelf-dated Lakeview Bakery bread. The last few weeks we have had some rather cold weather by Lower Mainland BC standards and the snow cover has made bird-life more difficult, as it has ours. Frozen water and slippery roads are not the norm. But this too will pass.
Sparrows in Winter
Bread on the stones is cast.
'Tis winter; and the stones are snowy cold:
Yet fluttering past
From leafless trees, the sparrows, young and old,
Flock, in their hunger, to be fed;
And on the cold stones find their daily bread.
Love, with a liberal hand,
Throws out its crumbs; then suddenly withdraws,
Hidden to stand
And watch, behind the window curtain's gauze,
Lest human face, too nigh, should scare
The timid birds from this their simple fare.
And they are glad, and feed,
With eager eye; and live on daily love,
Yet feel none. Greed
And passion stir their little breasts, and move
To bickering wars with wing and bill:
Yet love looks smiling on, and feeds them still.
Hard is this world, and cold;
And toil, care, woe, and sin, are everywhere.
Yet souls untold
Come, from above, to find their sustenance here;
And, midst the stony drought forlorn,
Find manna waiting for them every morn.
God gives that Bread from Heaven:
And yet His Presence not in glorious blaze
Of Fire is given;
But hidden under Veils, lest the bright rays
Of awful light and beauty here
Consume the sinful soul with deadly fear.
Men feed, and they are glad.
They see not God, the Unseen; and they turn,
With envy mad,
And o'er the very Gifts of Love, they burn.
Yet, fighting, feed, and grow, and will:
And patient God sees, loves, and feeds them still.
John Henry Hopkins Jr.