Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, GREY GHOSTS, by LILIAN C. B. MCA. MAYER


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

GREY GHOSTS, by                    
First Line: The grey ghosts have come back!
Last Line: But the grey ghosts shriek with laughter!
Subject(s): Birds; Migration


The grey ghosts have come back!
I hear them whispering in the many-stemmed woods;
I see their fingers in the long white filaments curling upward;

Their footprints are on the slippery rocks;
The hurrying stream shudders at their touch.
The birds fear them; they are all flying away.
Last week the robins went and the warblers;
Yesterday the swallows -- a black platoon over the lake;
Today a flight of finches, a meteor shower,
Pure gold, plunging after the sun.

Shackled to the chill earth,
Deeply rooted as old, old trees,
I watch them wheeling, curving, streaming in thin lines,
The birds on their way to the South --
Inebriates, thirsting for green tents and love again.
My strained eyes follow their flight to the last,
Strained ears, the last note --
The old sting in my throat!

But the grey ghosts shriek with laughter!





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