Poems (Storrie)/Bellbirds

by Agnes Louisa Storrie

Bellbirds.

You remember how we heard them
 In those quiet woodland dells,
Tiny grey-green songsters ringing
 In the air their elfin bells.

Bellbirds! bellbirds! magic cadence,
 Thin and sweet beyond compare
Like the footfall of a fairy
 Tinkling down a silver stair,

Or a string of rounded sea-pearls
 Swinging on a slender thread,
Interlacing, softly jangling
 In the tree-tops overhead.

Or a tiny crystal runnel
 Dropping down from stone to stone,
With a liquid splash of music
 Into fairy bubbles blown.

Bellbirds! bellbirds! through the weaving
 Of that sweet tautology
Runs a linking note of beauty
 Tuned to some high symphony,

Far beyond your narrow vision,
 Far beyond my larger view,
Yet the key-note has been given
 As an instinct unto you.

And for you, O! happy bellbirds,
 Life itself is harmony,
All your will, and all your duty
 Is just happily to be,

Just to be—a simple charter
 With the freedom of the sky,
Powers to wishes finely suited
 Pinions, and desire to fly.

Served by morning's airy lackeys,
 Catered for by flower and tree,
Little despots of the woodland,
 Sceptred by a melody!