Wild Bird
I said I had tamed them all and caged them,
The myriad birds of my dream;
Called them by docile names and paged them,
With law and precept I engaged them,
And I sat with my tame birds all around me—
Sat where you others came and found me.
See, here is Ardor—his wings are clipped;
And here is Truth (with spotted breast);
Imagination, preening her plumes;
Adventure, stolid, in golden barred rooms—
My myriad birds, my wild birds of no name,
“All tame (like yours) I said—all tame now,
Tame....”
And I sat with you, friends, and was suffered of you:
“The Bird-Fancier has tamed her birds—no fears.”
And I sat with you, listening through my tears.
For there was one wild bird (one I left wild, to see
That there ever had been with me such as he)—
One wild bird, clean as the sky—and free....
There come cries sometimes—black ducks, grey gulls,
Plover, wild swan, sickle billed curlews;
There are long dotted streamers across the sky
Of freedom and quest that cannot die....
There come songs....
And I sit and smile, with my tame birds preening,
From my window leaning....
Then he flies by the casement....
A stir of wings—a shape on the stars;
My head lifted, my heart on fire....
“My soul on your wings—Wild Bird!”