01.01.2011, 13:02
ON SOME HUMMING-BIRDS IN A GLASS CASE
For vacant song behold a shining theme !
These dumb-struck flutterers from Indian land,
The colour on whose crests, sweet Nature's hand.
Fulfils our richest thought of crimson gleam ;
Whose wings, thus spread and balanced forth, might seem
Slender as serpent's tongue or fairy's wand —
And, as with vantage of the sun we stand,
Each glossy bosom kindles in his beam ;
Ah me ! how soon does human death impair
The tender beauty of the fairest face.
Whatever balms and unguents we prepare !
While these resplendent creatures bear no trace,
Bright-bosom'd and bright-crested as they are,
No soil, nor token of the tomb's disgrace !
For vacant song behold a shining theme !
These dumb-struck flutterers from Indian land,
The colour on whose crests, sweet Nature's hand.
Fulfils our richest thought of crimson gleam ;
Whose wings, thus spread and balanced forth, might seem
Slender as serpent's tongue or fairy's wand —
And, as with vantage of the sun we stand,
Each glossy bosom kindles in his beam ;
Ah me ! how soon does human death impair
The tender beauty of the fairest face.
Whatever balms and unguents we prepare !
While these resplendent creatures bear no trace,
Bright-bosom'd and bright-crested as they are,
No soil, nor token of the tomb's disgrace !