TO A WATERFOWL. And I can listen to thee yet; O blessed bird! the earth we pace An unsubstantial, fairy place, That is fit home for thee! W. Wordsworth. TO A WATERFOWL. WHITHER, midst falling dew, While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Thy solitary way? Vainly the fowler's eye Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong, Seek'st thou the plashy brink There is a Power whose care Lone wandering, but not lost. 143 144 TO A WATERFOWL. All day thy wings have fanned At that far height, the cold thin atmosphere; And soon that toil shall end, Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest, Thou'rt gone, the abyss of heaven Hath swallowed up thy form; yet on my heart He who, from zone to zone, Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, Will lead my steps aright. W. C. Bryant. THE STARLINGS. 145 THE STARLINGS. EARLY in springtime, on raw and windy mornings, Beneath the freezing house-eaves I heard the starlings ́ sing “Ah dreary March month, is this then a time for building wearily? Sad, sad, to think that the year is but begun!” Late in the autumn, on still and cloudless evenings, Among the golden reed-beds I heard the starlings sing— "Ah that sweet March month when we and our mates were courting merrily; Sad, sad, to think that the year is all but done!” C. Kingsley. ITYLUS. SWALLOW, my sister, O sister swallow, What wilt thou do when the summer is shed? O swallow, sister, O fair swift swallow, The soft south whither thine heart is set? Shall not the grief of the old time follow? Modern Poets. 10 Sister, my sister, O fleet sweet swallow, I, the nightingale, all spring through, Sister, my sister, O soft light swallow, Though all things feast in the spring's guest-chamber, For where thou fliest I shall not follow, Swallow, my sister, O singing swallow, O swallow, sister, O fleeting swallow, My heart in me is a molten ember, And over my head the waves have met. But thou would'st tarry or I would follow, Couldst thou remember and I forget. ITYLUS. O sweet stray sister, O shifting swallow, Thy heart is light as a leaf of a tree; O swallow, sister, O rapid swallow, Are not the roofs and the lintels wet? O sister, sister, thy first-begotten! The hands that cling and the feet that follow, A, C, Swinburne. 147 |