“The ballad-singers and the Troubadours,

The street musicians of the heavenly city,

The birds, who make sweet music for us all

In our dark hours, as David did for Saul”?

XX
MIDWINTER BIRDS

WINTER COMRADES

Plume and go, ye summer folk

Fly from Winter’s killing stroke,

Bluebird, Sparrow, Thrush, and Swallow,

Wild Geese from the marshes follow,