We underestimate the heart. Brian Doyle shows us in a physical way what a heart is truly capable of. However, Doyle does more than show us the physical, beneath all the facts and extraordinary feats we see a deeper meaning form to represent the heart’s capacities. Doyle shows us an emotional way that we all can empathize to and are familiar with, if we can reach the level of understanding he is trying to convey in his message of hearts’.

Doyle begins with the hummingbird’s heart. He describes the hummingbird’s heart vividly through varies lengths, heights, touch, depth, and speed. He gives you a clear image of what the heart is, but to the reader the heart cannot be realistically visualized in motion because the description giving is much to grand to fathom. The hummingbird is a creature that preform incredible feats each and every day, because of its heart. Its heart who is so small that we could perhaps fit close to a thousand in our hands. When cold or hungry a hummingbird’s heart will come next to stand still in a risky bargain to maintain its life. If heat is not returned to the creature’s body it will cease to exist. A single one of these hearts hold onto a harsh burden. For the heart that sustains the hummingbird it cannot do extraordinary feats without drawbacks. For a heart is like an engine, with so much use it will burn out quicker. The hummingbird is an astonishing animal with the ability to dive down at sixty miles an hour, to fly backwards, and to visit a thousand flowers a day, but have a short life span. Throughout the passage it seems that Doyle is showing us the pro’s and con’s of a hummingbird’s heart, and he does, but he also shows us the similar ability we have in our own hearts what cannot find rest or that suffer from external properties.

Doyle continues not with one of the smallest hearts, but the biggest in the world. The blue whale’s heart. The blue whale’s heart is anything short of a miracle. Everything it does is on a gigantic scale all because its heart enables it to. Doyle focuses on the factual evidence that we know almost no factual evidence of the blue whale’s life. Its anatomy is very clear to use but what it does in the water and how it lives its life is a mystery. I think Doyle tries to convey a message that those in our world, our society with a big heart are a mystery on how they come to be the way they are. How humans can possibly love so much against all odds of obstacles, punishments, and harsh trials. That a scream of a respected and loved one’s voice can be heard and listened to from miles and miles and be responded to. “ But we know this: the animals with the largest hearts in the world generally travel in pairs, and their penetrating moaning cries, their piercing yearning tongue, can be heard underwater for miles and miles.” Through this excerpt we can see what is perceived and thought of those with the largest hearts in the world.

Throughout the whole passage that Doyle lays out for us I think the single most important piece to take away is the heart. No living creature lives without an interior liquid motion. Our heart creates the motion inside necessary for all of us to continue to live. We spend our lives opening our doors to others. To those closest to us we reveal all of us, but never our hearts. That no one can completely understand what a single human can feel at that moment or their past, and if they did understand they would never force one to reveal their heart for they know exactly just how fragile the heart is. Those that are wise understand that the heart that is capable of so much is also the most vulnerable piece of each one of us. Doyle begins this passage by making you fall in love with the abilities of the heart and continues with keep you in wonder, and finally finishes with showing you that the heart is as vulnerable as it is amazing. Almost as importantly is how the heart of a human became so powerful. Our hearts will never be perfect. We are all scarred, bent, spit on, thrown away, and discarded. However, through these struggles we harden our hearts. More importantly acquire the knowledge needed to help avoid oneself and their loved one’s mistakes over again.

The Joyas Volardores elegantly describes the powers and vulnerabilities of the heart in a way that leaves you in wonder. From the physical aspects of the heart Doyle brings out the strength required to sustain an organism, and from the emotional Doyle shows up how weak and fragile a heart can be despite its seemingly insurmountable characteristics. The heart is critical, both our biggest strength and at the same time the reason for our inevitable downfall.