March 21, 2007

  • A poem for the migrating birds

    OUT OF THE SOUTH

    A migrant song-bird I,
    Out of the blue, between the sea and the sky,
    Landward blown on bright untiring wings;
    Out of the south I fly,
    Urged by some vague, strange force of destiny,
    To where the young wheat springs,
    And the maize begins to grow
    And the clover fields to blow

    I have sought
    In far wild groves below the Tropic line,
    To lose old memories of this land of mine;
    I have fought
    This vague, mysterious power that flings me
    forth                                       
    Into the North;            
    But all in vain. When flutes of April blow,
    The immemorial longing lures me, and I go.

                                                - Maurice Thompson