Birds

James Montgomery (1771–1854)

From “The Pelican Island”

—BIRDS, the free tenants of land, air, and ocean,

Their forms all symmetry, their motions grace;

In plumage, delicate and beautiful,

Thick without burden, close as fishes’ scales,

Or loose as full-grown poppies to the breeze;

With wings that might have had a soul within them,

They bore their owners by such sweet enchantment,

—Birds, small and great, of endless shapes and colors,

Here flew and perched, there swam and dived at pleasure;

Watchful and agile, uttering voices wild

And harsh, yet in accordance with the waves

Upon the beach, the wind in caverns moaning,

Or winds and waves abroad upon the water.

Some sought their food among the finny shoals,

Swift darting from the clouds, emerging soon

With slender captives glittering in their beaks;

These in recesses of steep crags constructed

Their eyries inaccessible, and trained

Their hardy broods to forage in all weathers:

Others, more gorgeously apparelled, dwelt

Among the woods, on nature’s daintiest feeding,

Herbs, seeds, and roots; or, ever on the wing,

Pursuing insects through the boundless air:

In hollow trees or thickets these concealed

Their exquisitely woven nests; where lay

Their callow offspring, quiet as the down

On their own breasts, till from her search the dam

With laden bill returned, and shared the meal

Among her clamorous suppliants, all agape;

Then, cowering o’er them with expanded wings,

She felt how sweet it is to be a mother.

Of these, a few, with melody untaught,

Turned all the air to music within hearing,

Themselves unseen; while bolder quiristers

On loftiest branches strained their clarion-pipes,

And made the forest echo to their screams

Discordant,—yet there was no discord there,

But tempered harmony; all tones combining,

In the rich confluence of ten thousand tongues,

To tell of joy and to inspire it. Who

Could hear such concert, and not join in chorus?