A BIRD CALENDAR BY THE POETS.
January.
This is not the month of singing birds.
“Silently overhead the hen-hawk sails
With watchful, measuring eye, and for his quarry waits.”
—Lowell.
February.
Sometimes a flock of strange birds descends upon us from the north—the crossbills. There is an old tradition that the red upon their breast was caused by the blood of our Saviour, as they sought to free Him with their bills from the cross.
“And that bird is called the Crossbill,
Covered all with blood so dear,
In the groves of pine it singeth
Songs, like legends, strange to hear.”
—Longfellow.
March.
No birds are more closely associated with early spring than the swallows.
“Gallant and gay in their doublets grey,
All at a flash like the darting of flame,
Chattering Arabic, African, Indian—
Certain of springtime, the swallows came.
“Doublets of grey silk and surcoats of purple,
Ruffs of russet round each little throat,
Wearing such garb, they had crossed the waters,
Mariners sailing with never a boat.”
—Sir Edwin Arnold.
April.
“Winged lute that we call a Bluebird,
You blend in a silver strain,
The sound of the laughing waters,
The sound of spring’s sweet rain,
“The voice of the wind, the sunshine
And fragrance of blossoming things.
Ah, you are a poem of April
That God endowed with wings.”
May.
This is the month of the Bobolinks.
“Merrily, merrily, there they hie;
Now they rise and now they fly;
They cross and turn and in and out,
And down the middle and wheel about,
With ‘Phew, shew, Wadolincoln; listen to me Bobolincoln!’
Happy’s the wooing that’s speedily doing,
That’s merry and over with bloom of the clover,
Bobolincoln, Wadolincoln, Winterseebee, follow me.”
June.
“Then sings the Robin, he who wears
A sunset memory on his breast,
Pouring his vesper hymns and prayers
To the red shrine of the West.”
July.
The full tide of song is on the ebb, but you still hear in the shadowy woods the silvery notes of—
“The wise Thrush, who sings his song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
That first fine careless rapture.”
—Browning.
August.
The humming-bird.
“When the mild gold stars flower out,
As the summer gloaming goes,
A dim shape quivers about
Some sweet rich heart of a rose.
“Then you, by thoughts of it stirred,
Still dreamily question them,
‘Is it a gem, half bird,
Or is it a bird, half gem?’”
—Edgar Fawcett.
September.
There is something wistful in the notes of the birds preparing to depart. In the woods we see—
“A little bird in suit
Of sombre olive, soft and brown,
With greenish gold its vest is fringed,
Its tiny cap is ebon-tinged,
With ivory pale its wings are barred,
And its dark eyes are tender starred.
‘Dear bird,’ I said, ‘what is thy name?’
And thrice the mournful answer came,
So faint and far and yet so near—
‘Pewee! Pewee! Pewee!’”
—Trowbridge.
October.
This brown month surely belongs to the sparrows.
“Close beside my garden gate
Hops the sparrow, light, sedate.”
* * * “There he seems to peek and peer,
And to twitter, too, and tilt
The bare branches in between
With a fond, familiar mien.”
—Lathrop.
November.
In cold weather the little gray Chickadee cheers us with his “tiny voice”—
“Gay and polite, a cheerful cry,
Chick-chickadedee! Saucy note,
Out of sound heart and merry throat!
This scrap of valor, just for play,
Fronts the north wind with waistcoat gray.”
—Emerson.
December.
The sleep of the earth has begun under the white, thick snow. The Owl is abroad by night—
“A flitting shape of fluffy down
In the shadow of the woods,
‘Tu-wit! tu-whoo!’ I wish I knew;
Tell me the riddle, I beg—
Whether the egg was before the Owl
Or the Owl before the egg?”
Arranged by Ella F. Mosby.
So when the night falls and the dogs do howl,
Sing ho! for the reign of the horned owl.
We know not alway
Who are kings by day,
But the king of the night is the bold brown owl.
—Barry Cornwall.