Poems of Philip Henry Savage / Philip Henry Savage [electronic text]

IV

THE SONG-SPARROW

AT rest upon some quiet limb And singing to his pretty "marrow," Sweet-breasted friend of child and man, I love the bright eyes and the tan, Gray-mottled coat that suits the trim And winsome singing-sparrow.

He seeks no dear and lofty ground; His home is every ridge and furrow; In the low alder bushes he's At home, and in the wayside trees; Wherever man lives I have found The nest of the song-sparrow,

Except among the chimney-tops A-smoking where the streets are narrow; Where man has banished living green And scarce a blade of grass is seen He rarely comes, he never stops, The little rustic sparrow.

Where twigs are small and branches low And scarce the name of woods can borrow,

He flits and sings the whole day long And "Rivers run," is still his song, "And flowers blossom, breezes blow, And all for the song-sparrow!"

I meet him in the tufted field Among the clover-tops and yarrow; I hear him by the quiet brook, And always with the open look Of one who would not be concealed; And then I meet the sparrow

When golden lights at evening run Among the trees the copses thorough; And there I catch his joyous song, Stealing the moments that belong To songsters of the setting sun And not to the song-sparrow.

When touches of the coming night Set free the bands of hidden sorrow The night-bird sounds his ringing note, And from his melancholy throat The hermit pours a sad delight, And no one hears the sparrow.

His song is tuned for his to-day, With hope and promise for the morrow;

More lofty notes are upward sent, But none more simple and content, None cheerfuller in work and play Than that of the song-sparrow.