Shelter

Late last year our balcony was joined by 2 visitors.

Pigeons who made a nest in an empty flower pot.

A few days later we had a brace of eggs.

Then the marathon of looking after them. The parents took turns to cover and warm the eggs.

Finally we had two faintly ugly looking chicks.

How carefully the parents looked after them - day and night they warmed them in the winter cold - fed them - protected them from crows (and Eichers).

Asha and Enoch (and their parents) watched with wonder as the chicks grew into fledglings - soon too big to fit under their parent but demanding pigeon-tender-loving-care anyway.

We did our bit - running out to scare away marauding crows - but not the 24/7 care of the parents.

Kind of like our heavenly Father - who has the mother-like quality of brooding over us - He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart (Psalm 91.4).

The poet said it like this:

And for all this, nature is never spent;

There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;

And though the last lights off the black West went

Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs

— Because the Holy Ghost over the bent

World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

- Gerard Manley Hopkins (God's Grandeur)