Bird Parliament · 12 of 20

The Ring-Dove

Then from a Wood was heard unseen to coo The Ring-dove—‘Yusuf! Yusuf! Yusuf! Yu-’ (For thus her sorrow broke her Note in twain, And, just where broken, took it up again) ‘-suf! Yusuf! Yusuf! Yusuf!’—But one Note, Which still repeating, she made hoarse her throat:

Till checkt—‘O You, who with your idle Sighs Block up the Road of better Enterprise; Sham Sorrow all, or bad as sham if true, When once the better thing is come to do; Beware lest wailing thus you meet his Doom Who all too long his Darling wept, from whom You draw the very Name you hold so dear, And which the World is somewhat tired to hear.’

When Yusuf from his Father’s Home was torn, The Patriarch’s Heart was utterly forlorn, And, like a Pipe with but one stop, his Tongue With nothing but the name of ‘Yusuf’ rung. Then down from Heaven’s Branches flew the Bird Of Heav’n and said ‘God wearies of that word: Hast thou not else to do and else to say?’ So Jacob’s lips were sealed from that Day. But one Night in a Vision, far away His darling in some alien Field he saw Binding the Sheaf; and what between the Awe Of God’s Displeasure and the bitter Pass Of passionate Affection, sigh’d ‘Alas—‘ And stopp’d—But with the morning Sword of Flame That oped his Eyes the sterner Angel’s came ‘For the forbidden Word not utter’d by Thy Lips was yet sequester’d in that Sigh.’ And the right Passion whose Excess was wrong Blinded the aged Eyes that wept too long.