Magic Moment

In one of the brief moments of late afternoon sunshine, I was drawn to the sound of buzziness coming from the towering spikes of the foxgloves in the bank by the stream in my garden.

Quickly realising the opportunity for a Blipfoto, I grabbed by camera and did an 'up and under' shot and luckily caught this little bumbler strutting his stuff.

Later, I found this poem which explores the magic of the bee and the foxglove entitled - The Miracle of the Bees and the Foxgloves, written by Ann Stevenson.

Because hairs on their speckled daybeds baffle the little bees,
foxgloves come out to advertise for rich bumbling hummers,
who crawl into their tunnels-of-delight with drunken ease
(see Darwin's chapters on his foxglove summers)
plunging over heckles caked with sex-appealing stuff
to sip from every hooker its intoxicating liquor
and stop it propagating in a corner with itself.

And this is how the foxflower keeps its sex life in order.
Two anthers-adolescent, in a hurry to dehisce-
let fly too soon, so pollen lies in drifts around the floor.
Along swims bumbler bee and makes an undercoat of this,
reverses, exits, lets it fall by accident next door.
So ripeness climbs the bells of Digitalis, flower by flower,
undistracted by a Mind, or a Design, or by desire.