Poem: The Birds of Song

The inspiration for this poem is owed to several factors, one being the reading of Robert Frost's poem After Apple-Picking and the other being the Belief and Unbelief class I was taking when I wrote it.

The Birds of Song

The birds of song are here to stay,

Like feathers in a diamond,

Concerned not so much with today

They flit and fly and swoop and soar

Amid the white-washed firmament

To find some shallow perch to sit

Beneath the power lines.

The birds of song all dance in rows

And dine on worms from foreign fruit,

The rust red pulp that stains the shirts

Of local boys out apple picking

In strangers orchards after dark;

The pulse migrations of the heart

Before the winter.

The birds of song have gone away

To where the ice-caked river flows

And left their leaf shells sitting in

A tree that cracks and spreads against

The frosted panes of sky and shows

A silver crown of thorny light

Nesting in its boughs.