Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE BIRD CATCHER'S BOY, by THOMAS HARDY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE BIRD CATCHER'S BOY, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Father, I fear your trade
Last Line: One sailor boy.


'FATHER, I fear your trade:
Surely it's wrong!
Little birds limed and made
Captive life-long.

'Larks bruise and bleed in jail,
Trying to rise;
Every caged nightingale
Soon pines and dies.'

'Don't be a dolt, my boy!
Birds must be caught;
My lot is such employ,
Yours to be taught.

'Soft shallow stuff as that
Out from your head!
Just learn your lessons pat,
Then off to bed.'

Lightless, without a word
Bedwise he fares;
Groping his way is heard
Seek the dark stairs

Through the long passage, where
Hang the caged choirs:
Harp-like his fingers there
Sweep on the wires.

Next day, at dye of dawn,
Freddy was missed:
Whither the boy had gone
Nobody wist.

That week, the next one, whiled:
No news of him:
Weeks up to months were piled:
Hope dwindled dim.

Yet not a single night
Locked they the door,
Waiting, heart-sick, to sight
Freddy once more.

Hopping there long anon
Still the birds hung:
Like those in Babylon
Captive, they sung.

One wintry Christmastide
Both lay awake;
All cheer within them dried,
Each hour an ache.

Then some one seemed to flit
Soft in below;
'Freddy's come!' Up they sit,
Faces aglow.

Thereat a groping touch
Dragged on the wires
Lightly and softly - much
As they were lyres;

'Just as it used to be
When he came in,
Feeling in darkness the
Stairway to win!'

Waiting a trice or two
Yet, in the gloom,
Both parents pressed into
Freddy's old room.

There on the empty bed
White the moon shone,
As ever since they'd said,
'Freddy is gone!'

That night at Durdle-Door
Foundered a hoy,
And the tide washed ashore
One sailor boy.





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