Bleeding Hearts

Sometimes the joy of "birding" is experienced not so much in seeing the bird but in having all the senses captivated by other living things around you while an invisible bird provides background music. On a recent evening in a local park a Winter Wren was singing its heart out somewhere nearby, while these Bleeding Hearts glowed in a random ray of sunlight. As Annie Dillard wrote in the first chapter of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, "Beauty and grace are performed whether or not we will or sense them. The least we can do is try to be there."