Page:Pocahontas and Other Poems (NY).pdf/58

"I am ready to go," cried the querulous wren,
"From the hateful homes of these northern men;
My throat is sore, and my feet are blue;
I fear I have caught the consumption too."
And the oriole told, with a flashing eye,
How his plumage was spoil'd by this frosty sky.

Then up went the thrush with a trumpet call,
And the martins came forth from their box on the wall,
And the owlets peep'd out from their secret bower,
And the swallows convened on the old church-tower,
And the council of blackbirds was long and loud,
Chattering and flying from tree to cloud.

"The dahlia is dead on her throne," said they;
"And we saw the butterfly cold as clay;
Not a berry is found on the russet plains,
Not a kernel of ripen'd maize remains;
Every worm is hid—shall we longer stay
To be wasted with famine? Away! Away!"

But what a strange clamour on elm and oak,
From a bevy of brown-coated mocking-birds' broke;
The theme of each separate speaker they told
In a shrill report, with such mimicry bold,
That the eloquent orators started to hear
Their own true echo, so wild and clear.

Then tribe after tribe, with its leader fair,
Swept off, through the fathomless depths of air.
Who marketh their course to the tropics bright?
Who nerveth their wing for its weary flight?