Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE INVITATION by NORMAN ROWLAND GALE

First Line: COME, THRUSHES, BLACKCAPS, FINCHES, ALL
Last Line: THROUGH ALL THIS LEAFY COUNTY!
Subject(s): BIRDS; COUNTRY LIFE; COURTSHIP;
COME, thrushes, blackcaps, finches, all,
To peck my Laura's bounty!
There's not a sweetheart treats you so
In all this leafy county.
Yes, sparrows too! for God forbid
That here in bloom and grasses
My Love and I should rank you birds
In low and upper classes!

Both large and little, russet, bright,
I call at Laura's asking;
And we shall watch you at your feast,
Upon the greensward basking;
But this must first be understood
By feathered folk, and fully—
All sweet content! and, blackbird, sir,
Remember not to bully!

Look down these lovely cherry-aisles
At fruit by bills unfretted,
The thousand thousand tiny globes
Our jealous gardener netted;
For, bandits of the air, your troops
To storm the orchard muster;
And woe betide the burdened tree,
And woe the scarlet cluster.

My Sweetheart pressed me yesterday
To give you of our plenty;
She begged two glowing trees for you
From out this line of twenty:
Why, birds, her cherried lips, more fair
Than ever Venus parted,
Need only tremble with a wish,
To make me tender-hearted!

God gave us with a willing hand
A share of sky and mountain,
With time to idle in the grass
And listen to the fountain.
Our sideposts and our lintel show
His mark of recollection:
We pay a tithe to Him through you,
The birds of our affection.

You cannot come with wings too quick,
With appetites too hearty,
To please your hostess and your host
On Laura's birthday-party.
She reaches up a sunburnt hand
To free her shining bounty—
Fall to, my birds! and praise her name
Through all this leafy county!



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