# Pocahontas and Other Poems (New York)/Migration of Birds

MIGRATION OF BIRDS.
November came on, with an eye severe, And his stormy language was hoarse to hear; And the glittering garland of brown and red, Which he wreathed for a while round the forest's head, With a sudden anger he rent away, And all was cheerless, and bare, and gray.
Then the houseless grasshopper told his woes, And the humming-bird sent forth a wail for the rose, And the spider, that weaver of cunning so deep, Roll'd himself up in a ball to sleep; And the cricket his merry horn laid by On the shelf, with the pipe of the dragon-fly.
Soon the birds were heard, at the morning prime, Consulting of flight to a warmer clime. "Let us go! let us go!" said the bright-wing'd jay; And his gay spouse sang from a rocking spray, "I am tired to death of this hum-drum tree, I'll go, if 'tis only the world to see."
"Will you go?" asked the robin, "my only love?" And a tender strain from the leafless grove
Responded, "Wherever your lot is cast, Mid summer skies or the northern blast, I am still at your side your heart to cheer, Though dear is our nest in the thicket here."
"I am ready to go," cried the querulous wren, "From the hateful homes of these northern men; My throat is sore, and my feet are blue; I fear I have caught the consumption too." And the oriole told, with a flashing eye, How his plumage was spoil'd by this frosty sky.
Then up went the thrush with a trumpet call, And the martins came forth from their box on the wall, And the owlets peep'd out from their secret bower, And the swallows convened on the old church-tower, And the council of blackbirds was long and loud, Chattering and flying from tree to cloud.
"The dahlia is dead on her throne," said they; "And we saw the butterfly cold as clay; Not a berry is found on the russet plains, Not a kernel of ripen'd maize remains; Every worm is hid—shall we longer stay To be wasted with famine? Away! Away!"
But what a strange clamour on elm and oak, From a bevy of brown-coated mocking-birds' broke; The theme of each separate speaker they told In a shrill report, with such mimicry bold, That the eloquent orators started to hear Their own true echo, so wild and clear.
Then tribe after tribe, with its leader fair, Swept off, through the fathomless depths of air. Who marketh their course to the tropics bright? Who nerveth their wing for its weary flight?
Who guideth that caravan's trackless way By the star at night and the cloud by day?
Some spread o'er the waters a daring wing, In the isles of the southern sea to sing, Or where the minaret, towering high, Pierces the blue of the Moslem sky, Or amid the harem's haunts of fear Their lodges to build and their nurslings rear.
The Indian fig, with its arching screen, Welcomes them in to its vistas green, And the breathing buds of the spicy tree Thrill at the burst of their melody, And the bulbul starts, mid his carol clear, Such a rushing of stranger-wings to hear.
O wild-wood wanderers! how far away From your rural homes in our vales ye stray. But when they are waked by the touch of Spring, Shall we see you again with your glancing wing? Your nests mid our household trees to raise, And stir our hearts in our Maker's praise?