 | The poetical works of Lucy Larcom |  |
298
A SONG-SPARROW IN MARCH.
How much do the birds know, afloat in the air,
Of our changeable, strange human life and its care?
Who can tell what they utter,
With carol and flutter,
Of the joy of our hearts, or the pain hidden there?
Of our changeable, strange human life and its care?
Who can tell what they utter,
With carol and flutter,
Of the joy of our hearts, or the pain hidden there?
In the March morning twilight I turned from a bed
Where a soul had just risen from a form lying dead:
The dim world was ringing
With a song-sparrow's singing
That went up and pierced the gray dawn overhead.
Where a soul had just risen from a form lying dead:
The dim world was ringing
With a song-sparrow's singing
That went up and pierced the gray dawn overhead.
It rose like an ecstasy loosed from the earth;
Like a rapture repeating the song of its birth;
In that clear burst of gladness
Night shook off her sadness,
And death itself echoed the heavenly mirth.
Like a rapture repeating the song of its birth;
In that clear burst of gladness
Night shook off her sadness,
And death itself echoed the heavenly mirth.
While her sorrowful burden the sufferer laid by,
The little bird passed, and caught up to the sky,
And sang to gray meadow
And mist-wreath and shadow
The triumph a mortal had found it to die.
The little bird passed, and caught up to the sky,
And sang to gray meadow
And mist-wreath and shadow
The triumph a mortal had found it to die.
Oh, the birds cannot tell what it is that they sing!
But to me must the song-sparrow's melody bring,
Whenever I hear it,
The joy of a spirit
Released into life on that dim dawn of spring.
But to me must the song-sparrow's melody bring,
Whenever I hear it,
The joy of a spirit
Released into life on that dim dawn of spring.
| The poetical works of Lucy Larcom | |