LITMIR.BIZ

      He rises and begins to round,

      He drops the silver chain of sound,

      Of many links without a break,

      In chirrup, whistle, slur and shake,

      All intervolved and spreading wide,

      Like water-dimples down a tide

      Where ripple ripple overcurls

      And eddy into eddy whirls;

      A press of hurried notes that run

      So fleet they scarce are more than one,

      Yet changeingly the trills repeat

      And linger ringing while they fleet,

      Sweet to the quick o’ the ear, and dear

      To her beyond the handmaid ear,

      Who sits beside our inner springs,

      Too often dry for this he brings,

      Which seems the very jet of earth

      At sight of sun, her music’s mirth,

      As up he wings the spiral stair,

      A song of light, and pierces air

      With fountain ardour, fountain play,

      To reach the shining tops of day,

      And drink in everything discerned

      An ecstasy to music turned,

      Impelled by what his happy bill

      Disperses; drinking, showering still,

      Unthinking save that he may give

      His voice the outlet, there to live

      Renewed in endless notes of glee,

      So thirsty of his voice is he,

      For all to hear and all to know

      That he is joy, awake, aglow;

      The tumult of the heart to hear

      Through pureness filtered crystal-clear,

      And know the pleasure sprinkled bright

      By simple singing of delight;

      Shrill, irreflective, unrestrained,

      Rapt, ringing, on the jet sustained

      Without a break, without a fall,

      Sweet-silvery, sheer lyrical,

      Perennial, quavering up the chord