As pointed out in a previous journal, I did not pay close attention to her poetry early on. Otherwise, I might have been more careful, and might have had a better understanding of what she is about, and her agenda.
And if I am reading one of her early poems from late April 2012 correctly, she appears to have been warning me (and other people) about who she really is and what she is really after.
She paints herself as a hummingbird (something of a musical connotation), who lands to get nourishment, then quickly moves on “Fast, long and hard” taking refuge with someone else.
This landing, feeding and taking off again has become her reality.
Nothing is permanent, or for that matter meant to be mean.
This is simply who she is and what she does, and how she survives.
She “flits” in and out of other people’s vision, and for a time, some are mesmerized by her, searching for some deeper meaning before she moves on from them.
While those whose lives she touches want to know why, there is no real answer except that this is simply her nature, no other reason, it is what she is and what she must do.
This poem may or may not have been aimed at me. It comes at a time when I raised those kinds of questions after she said certain things to me, and at a time when she clearly was making her move to leave me and attend to our temporary boss. And, of course, raised the question how she could leap from one flower to another so frivolously.
While not as blatant a statement as she made in the trickle and fair/unfair poems, the message – in hindsight – is clear.
One cannot question what she does because it is not a matter of reason or logic it is simply fundamental to who and what she is there is no deeper meaning and had I been wiser when I first saw the poem much of what transpired a short time after she posted it might have been avoided
perhaps she suspected I already knew she was moving on to our temporary boss and needed to make it clear this was not a criticism of me so much as her need for substance I could not provide for her.
The use of Hummingbird as a metaphor sums up much since it is a tiny often defenseless creature who relies on its cunning quickness and its invisibility to survive.
In later poems she would call herself an accidental thief and continue this theme of temporary relationships that other people take more seriously than she does but this poem sets up the foundation of the rest pointing out this behavior is not intentional so much as instinctual and she asks her critics what else can she do since this is in her nature.
One poem posted last September summed up her life as to how many times she fell in love. This poem suggests love is not her goal and it is impossible to pin her down since nature requires her to behave this way, getting what she needs from this person before moving on to the next.
This is her life to visit than to leave to taste the honey of this or that temporary relationship then on to the next always on the move always looking for the next person or situation knowing perhaps that no one will satisfy all her needs and she seems determined not to let tied down to anyone, calling those who want to possess her misguided.
The poem is constructed in two stanzas, the first describing the habits of the hummingbird, the second ascribing those characteristics to herself in her relationship to fellow human beings.
She makes it clear that this is what she does and what she will likely always do, a friendly warning not to take disappointment personally, or to try to find deep meaning in any of it. One does not question a sunflower or a bumble bee. These things exist, they have their own qualities and habits, what allows them to thrive. There is no great lesson of life to be learned, although it might be pleasant in the short term to be the flower she leans on and enjoy that temporary union while it lasts.
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