by Donna Obeid

We did it every morning and every night. We did it in honor of the god of earth and sky. We did it as if our days depended on it. We did it without influencing or recording or uploading. Who would want to know about us anyway? They had already seen this sort of thing. We did it with a simple white house that hung from a hooked pole in the center of the garden. We did it like angels cloaked in the stillness. We did it for kindness, for love. And when we went back inside, we stood watching from the window. Always astonished how they came like little divine chariots. The cedar waxwing and chickadee, the lesser goldfinch, the spotted towhee. They came with flair and with a flurry of wings. They came with tremendous song, their voices filling the sky like a heavenly injunction, making us forget how hard our lives, how troubled this world.

Donna Obeid is an award-winning writer and educator who currently lives in Stanford, California. Read more at: donnaobeid.com and find her @donnaowrites on Instagram, Facebook and on Twitter.