The Blue Bird - An 1841 Poem

By David Paul Brown.

O, do you hear the Blue Bird,

The herald of the spring —

How cheerily he tunes his pipe,

How blithely plumes his wing!

 

He breathes the native note of praise

To the great Source of Good,

The trees are vocal with his lays,

Instinct with gratitude.

 

He mounts upon the downy wing,

He cleaves the ambient air,

Inhales the balmy breath of spring,

And wakes the world to prayer.

 

The fertile Earth at nature's voice,

Unlocks her precious store,

And mount and vale and plain rejoice,

And greet the genial hour.

 

The purling stream no longer bound,

In winter's icy chain,

Sparkles beneath the sunny ray,

And freely flows again :

 

Flows — as life flows, in fancy,

Pure, radiant and serene,

Through flow'rs and fields and fragrant groves,

That animate the scene :

 

Flows on, till winter checks its tide,

And robs it of its bloom,

Like death, that in our youthful pride,

Consigns us to the tomb.

 

Yet man, for whom these notes are sung,

For whom these waters flow,

For whom this vernal wealth abounds,

The monarch here below!

 

Man, only man! with lofty brow,

With stubborn heart and knee,

Looks o'er this smiling universe,

Ungrateful, Lord, to thee.

 

The perils of the winter past —

Spring, like a blossoming bride,

The summer's and the autumn's hope,

All magnify his pride!

 

There — there he stands — a rebel still,

A recent to that Power,

That murmurs in each limpid rill,

And breaches in every flower.

April 13, 1841. Winyah Observer 1(8): 4.