Page:Studies in Song - Swinburne (1880).djvu/81

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THE BIRDS.

(685-723.)

Come on then, ye dwellers by nature in darkness, and
like to the leaves' generations,
That are little of might, that are moulded of mire,
unenduring and shadowlike nations,
Poor plumeless ephemerals, comfortless mortals, as visions
of creatures fast fleeing,
Lift up your mind unto us that are deathless, and dateless
the date of our being: