Poems (Edwards)/The Wandering Bird
THE WANDERING BIRD.
There came to our forests a wandering Bird,It moved 'mid the leaves as if something it feared,It perched on the boughs of the dark bending trees,And floated along like the wing of the breeze;And soft, as my spirit bent over that bird,From its desolate bosom, low numbers I heard.
"I am alone in the forest dim, Alone, alone, I must chant my hymn, The birds I loved have left me all, They are gone to dwell in a summer hall, They have soared away to a clime more free, And a bluer sky,—alas for me! I linger here in these dark old woods, I roam along through their solitudes, Where no song is sung and no step is heard, Alas! alas! for the stranger Bird."
"Lone Bird," I exclaimed, with a tear and sigh,As I looked in its soft and bewitching eye,"Thou art not a stranger forever alone,There's many a spirit on earth like thine own;Thou wandering Bird, knowest thou, that thou artPortraying the loneliness of many a heart."