Collection 6: Birds

Collection 6: Birds

Flight of birds, Dawn Chorus, Towards Bigger Poems

Flight of Birds

Meaning and remeaning with the seasons,

This is their art. They follow

The Sun swelling in the East,

The grub swelling in the ooze.

They celebrate in vast carnival

Wind, star, storm and bird-wing

And the expense of themselves.

They plan nothing: bird-blood beats in them:

"We are and we are Yours."

But this thin line of words thrown out

Along the sky-tide of Your will,

Does it hold anything of You?

Yet because I must learn You

I shall outfly these birds.

Dawn Chorus

Is it more of a song if it freely

Sings with the death of darkness

As the unrestrained Spring pours

Through the throats of these tiny birds?

Or are there deeper human notes

That ring with our Autumn griefs

And Winter silences, until

They alchemise into worship?

At one end of my guitar

There is a chest for hoarding

Golden chords, until they swell

With summer harmonies.

At the darkest heart of the world

There is a man, all wounds,

Who gives Himself to the uttermost

In the ultimate act of praise.

If it will make me fit

For some part in the chorus

Then let me, Lord, be an echo of 

The ache in Your Spring song.

Towards Bigger Poems

“The mountains skip like lambs… the trees of the field clap their hands”

Immobilised, these mountains

Have no heels for skipping

But they dance in the swaying of their trees.

These sitkas, oaks and cedars

Have no hands for clapping

But the breezes shake their branches.

These branches have no song

But they lift up the birds

And carry their carols skywards.

But the birds have no words…

Here, little sisters, take mine.

Let me be your librettist

That your song may resound in me

That my song may be healed with

Your ancient majesty, your green upwelling,

Your swift-winged melody.

Then our dance and our applause,

Our music and our meaning

Will be offered in praise to the One

Whose party is just getting started…