Impatient of the undesired burden,
They huddled on the ground, disconsolate,
While some complained reproachfully:—"Does Fate
Lay on us this new care in lieu of guerdon
"For all that we have done and borne so bravely?
Is't not enough that oft, through blight and snow,
We starve—we who from toil no respite know?"
They drooped, they pined; but said the bluebird gravely,
His pretty head with gallant air uplifting:
"This is indeed a burden which we bear—
An added burden; yet—O why despair?"—
Then, from one foot to t' other his weight shifting,
He hopped about, in valor growing bolder,
Till—for new effort new ambition brings—
He found at last that he could stretch his wings! . . .
Straightway the birds forgot the day grown colder—
Forgot the future's care, the past's privation;
And when, their fond desires fixed on high,
They knew—O happy birds!—that they could fly,—
The burden had become their exaltation!
