Hope found a hummingbird one morning in spring With two frightened eyes, and one bad broken wing She cradled it close, and she took it inside Went to her mother with tears in her eyes Saying “Look, she’s so small--is she going to die?” Her mother bent down and said, “Baby, don’t cry. We’ll build her a nest, and make sure that she’s warm And we’ll keep her until she’s not hurt anymore And she will live She will fly She is stronger than you know Give her love Give her time She will heal She will grow.” Hope would come running from school every day To sit with the bird while the other kids played Each morning she’d wake and make sure it was fed And each night it slept in a box by her bed Summer was coming, the weeks rolled on by But the hummingbird didn’t seem ready to fly But Hope just kept praying, and cared for her bird And over and over, she spoke the same words: "She will live She will fly She is stronger than you know Give her love Give her time She will heal She will grow." And then one bright morning, the time came at last They set the bird free, she flew off in a flash. Hope looked at her mother, said, “How did you know?” Her mother just said, “I believed it was so. When you were born, they said you were too small To go home, that you might never go home at all But we knew that you’d make it, and each night we’d stay Close by your side, and we’d kiss you, and say 'She will live She will fly She is stronger than we know Give her love Give her time She will heal She will grow. She will live She will fly She is stronger than we know Give her love Give her time She will heal She will grow. Give her love Give her time She will heal She will grow.'"

Rabbit, Rabbit, run and tell us Rabbit, Rabbit, what good news? Sun is laughing in his heaven And the moon is on the move. Shake the winter from your rooftops Can’t you taste the green of spring? Now’s the time to race and hop And never stop for anything! Rabbit, Rabbit, what swift shadow Follows ever close behind, Tireless and without pity? He is called the hound of Time. From my start until my finish, On his course I am beset He will howl and gnash and rattle But he hasn’t caught me yet I am light enough for leaping Over streams and starry skies I have ways and I have secrets And the wildness to be wise Rabbit, Rabbit, in the twilight Waiting for your mother moon Thousands of your feet will echo Longer than the lonesome loon Children of the earth, awaken Listen for the rising wind Hold it fast and fly to freedom Round the world and home again Round the world and home again Round the world and home again

Long enough to learn the shape Her shadow made against the stars Bigger than the night Staying by your side Long enough to learn the voice To follow where the grass is tall Golden as it sways There she made the way for you Long enough to love her Not enough to let her go Ask the little raindrops at the window, they know Your grandmother's grandmother's face Her tears are with you And her memories too And you're never alone in this place. Strong enough to rise and face The day that breaks your world anew Suddenly so strange Everything has changed Strong enough to trust your heart To find the ones who wait for you Family and friends Helping you begin again Strong enough together For anything, everything A little time, a little tenderness Render this sorrow a vestige of grace You can sleep now, you’re safe, And your worry can wait, And you're never alone in this place Long enough to learn your way, To lead the herd to waters new Curious and bold, little ancient soul Long enough to learn the face of man can be a friend to you Faithfully and true There you found forgiveness, too Long enough to love you Strong enough to let you go. So, another life, another journey, The turning of earth in your feet in the clay And when you have grown, make a trail of your own And perhaps it will show us the way May it stand to remind, be a guide and a sign That we are not alone in this place We are not alone in this place.

The tardigrade is a micro-animal, sometimes known as a water bear you can also call it a moss piglet - it lives here, there, and most everywhere Tardigrades are aquatic invertebrates, soft and slow, segmented and strange and built to survive! Half a billion years later, even their ancestors’ fossils remain. Yes, the tardigrade is a tubular animal Tiny, tenacious, and tougher and than tough From the high Himalayas to deep-sea volcanoes There’s no one on Earth made of sturdier stuff! Tardigrades can withstand radiation and live for ten days in the vacuum of space, or dehydrate, induce metabolic suspension for years, and come back and MAKE MORE TARDIGRADES! Trooping and trundling, tumbling tardigrades Buoyant and beautifully bumbling tardigrades! Nature at her most mysterious mischief This model of wonderful weirdness hath made! Its mouth is tubular (stylets for piercing!) Its limbs are tubular (wee little claws!) Its trunk is tubular (barrel of swimmies!) Sometimes its glands are tubular too! Yes, the tardigrade is a tubular animal Tiny, tenacious, and tougher and than tough From Antarctic ice to subtropical springs There’s no one on Earth made of sturdier stuff! From time immemorial to low Earth orbit There is nobody else made of sturdier stuff! Long live the water bear!

Dream of twilight, dream of fireflight Dancing close in darkling groves, in silent synchronicity Signals flashing brief and bright, searching with a living light For one twin flame who burns the same, in patient luminosity While further in the forest halls The fox-and-fairy-fire grow Their dusky carpet all aglow A warning or a welcome call-- Come winds and travelers afar Their spores will sail and fall like stars And where they settle they will prosper, Making more of what they are. Beneath grey mountains tossing Beyond the eyes of exploration from above In sunless mystery There swims a world of light and colors unimagined Where courting creatures pulse and flare And spectral hunters cast their lures from the shadows And all is strange and silent there Lights in the sea, lights in the earth, lights in the sky Where there is life, there is a way to shine Dreams of dark night, dreams of azure light Gathering in hollow ringing hills and mountains warm and green Blue the ghosts who haunt the trees Shining soft and steadily To speak in tones and words unknown And fade at last to lives unseen. In deep cathedrals of the earth The glow-worm spins her silken snare And spends her whole life glowing there Until the hour of her birth When, bright as she will ever be, She builds another galaxy To rest in its reflection, Her metamorphosis complete. Sea-sparkles rise and tumble They whirl and bloom and rise again upon the waves to fall in bright blue fire Sometimes they land among the lovers on the strand Sometimes they're scattered with the foam Some nights a full moon will bedazzle and enchant them Some nights they lead a lost man home Lights in the sea, lights in the earth, lights in the sky Where there is life, there is a way to shine Lights in the sea, lights in the earth, lights in the sky Where there is life, there is a way to shine.

I had me a little dog, his color it was brown I taught him how to whistle, to sing and dance around His legs they were fourteen yards long, his ears so very wide, Around the world in half a day, upon him I could ride Sing, Darby O'Day Sing, Autumn to May I had me a little frog, he wore a vest of red He leaned upon a silver cane, top hat on his head He'd speak of far off places, of things to see and do And all the kings and queens he'd met while sailing in a shoe Sing, Darby O'Day Sing, Autumn to May I had me a little hen, all speckled, gay and fair I sat her on an oyster shell, she hatched me out a hare The hare it sprang a handsome horse, fifteen hands full high And him that tells a bigger tale would have to tell a lie Sing, Darby O'Day Sing, Autumn to May I had me a little glass, the color it was green And in it all the wonders that man had ever seen I put it in my pocket and tied it with a cloth Cried and cried the day I found that it had been lost I had me a little dog, his color it was brown I taught him how to whistle, to sing and dance around His legs they were fourteen yards long, his ears so very wide, Around the world in half a day, upon him I could ride Sing, Darby O'Day Sing, Autumn to May