Birds

"To the red rising moon, and loud and deep The nightingale is singing from the steep."

"To-night, beneath an operatic moon I listened to the flattered nightingale, Ornate, melodious, impeccable— Round notes of fluted silver soft as dew— The soul of Tennyson become a bird."

"Soft as Memnon's harp at morning, To the inward ear devout, Touched by light, with heavenly warning Your transporting chords ring out. Every leaf in every nook, Every wave in every brook, Chanting with a solemn voice Minds us of our better choice."

"Adieu! adieu! thy plaintive anthem fades Past the near meadows, over the still stream, Up the hill-side; and now 'tis buried deep In the next valley-glades: Was it a vision, or a waking dream? Fled is that music:—do I wake or sleep?"

"Thou wast not born for death, immortal bird! No hungry generations tread thee down; The voice I hear this passing night was heard In ancient days by emperor and clown."

"Where the nightingale doth sing Not a senseless, tranced thing, But divine melodious truth."

"The nightingale appear'd the first, And as her melody she sang, The apple into blossom burst, To life the grass and violets sprang."

"Like a wedding-song all-melting Sings the nightingale, the dear one."

"Vox, philomela, tua cantus edicere cogit, Inde tui laudem rustica lingua canit."

"Sweet bird, that sing'st away the early hours, Of winter's past or coming void of care, Well pleaséd with delights which present are, Fair seasons, budding sprays, sweet-smelling flowers."

"Westminster Hall itself is a shady solitude where nightingales might sing."

"Now the nightingale, the pretty nightingale, The sweetest singer in all the forest choir, Entreats thee, sweet Peggy, to hear thy true love’s tale: Lo, yonder she sitteth, her breast against a brier."

"I said to the Nightingale: "Hail, all hail! Pierce with thy trill the dark, Like a glittering music-spark, When the earth grows pale and dumb.""

"'Tis the merry nightingale That crowds, and hurries, and precipitates With fast thick warble his delicious notes, As he were fearful that an April night Would be too short for him to utter forth His love-chant, and disburthen his full soul Of all its music!"

""Most musical, most melancholy" bird! A melancholy bird! Oh! idle thought! In nature there is nothing melancholy."

"Birds of the wilderness! Ye woodland choristers of many dyes! Wake ye not in the night at my distress, Poured forth more deep than all your melodies? How can ye sleep beneath the boundless sea Of my soul's grief poured forth in melody?"

"I have heard the nightingale herself."

"The holy nightingale Winds up his long, long shakes of ecstasy, With notes that seem but the protracted sounds Of glassy runnels bubbling over rocks."

"It is the hour when from the boughs The nightingale's high note is heard; It is the hour when lovers' vows Seem sweet in every whisper'd word."

"His comb was redder than the fyn coral, And batailed, as it were a castel-wal. His bile was blak, and as the jeet it shoon; Lyk asur were his legges, and his toon; His nayles whytter than the lilie flour, And lyk the burned gold was his colour."

"A flash of harmless lightning, A mist of rainbow dyes, The burnished sunbeams brightening From flower to flower he flies."

"And the humming-bird that hung Like a jewel up among The tilted honeysuckle horns They mesmerized and swung In the palpitating air, Drowsed with odors strange and rare, And, with whispered laughter, slipped away And left him hanging there."

"Quick as a humming bird is my love, Dipping into the hearts of flowers— She darts so eagerly, swiftly, sweetly Dipping into the flowers of my heart."

"Jewelled coryphée With quivering wings like shielding gauze outspread."

"Hummingbirds, like all Neotropical migrants, don't recognize any borders, boundaries, or countries; they consider all of the Americas their home, nesting in the northern part of their range and wintering in the southern part."

"My work is loving the world. Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird—equal seekers of sweetness."

"The restless activity and general appearance of the Humming-bird make one almost hesitate to believe that it is really a bird and not a brilliant tropical insect. It possesses no ; few people see it except on the wing, and its is so rarely found that to most people the bird is merely a sudden apparition, seen hovering over a flower, its ruby throat sparkling in the sun. When the Humming-bird's nest is discovered, it turns out to be a structure as delicate and rare as its little architect. It is often fixed on a -covered twig, frequently in s, but as often on tall forest trees. To the outside of the nest, bits of gray lichen are fastened, so that at a distance the nest is mistaken for a knob of the twig itself. The eggs are always two, ridiculously small, like s."

"[Footnote:] Much still remains to be learned about his sex life because the Hummingbird is quicker than the eye."

"The male is colored much more gorgeously than the female so that he can be shot and made into feather embroidery."

"Across the downs a hummingbird Came dipping through the bowers, He pivoted on emptiness To scrutinize the flowers."

"In my backyard in north Texas On the hottest summer night Hummingbirds fall all around us Their hearts stopped beating in mid-flight."

"I am a vegetarian for health reasons—the health of the chicken."

"Eggs are generally considered kosher, but what about eggs from chickens who spend their entire lives imprisoned in a cage one cubic foot in size? Food pellets are brought to them on one conveyor belt; their droppings and eggs are taken away on another. The Bible forbids us to torment animals or cause them any unnecessary grief. Raising chickens who can go out sometimes and see the sky or eat a worm or blade of grass is one thing, but manufacturing them in the concentration camp conditions of contemporary "poultry ranches" is quite another."

"Perhaps if we had realized they are birds, with all the wonderful characteristics of birds, we would have paid closer attention to the ways in which chickens can enchant us. Take dust-bathing, for example. We call it a bath because the chicken finds a small indentation of dry earth and then proceeds to immerse herself in it as into a warm bath. The earth cleans her feathers. The first time I saw a chicken taking a dust bath, stretching out one iridescent wing and holding it up to the sunshine, then settling into the warmth of the afternoon only to fly effortlessly to a tree to roost in the evening, I was astonished."

"I didn't even know that chickens could fly, and suddenly one was landing on me. It happened when I was visiting a farm sanctuary. If I had been younger I would have asked my parents if I could take her home, please! After all, she chose me. Never mind that she chose everybody; she was a particularly friendly chicken. She made soft, strange cooing sounds and nestled into my arms like a happy kitten. … In fact she was an ordinary chicken, but simply one who had no reason to believe that people were after her. This is how chickens and humans would relate to one another if one was not exploited and the other doing the exploiting. Very much like cats and dogs. They just wait for the chance."

"The worst torture to which a battery hen is exposed is the inability to retire somewhere for the laying act. For the person who knows something about animals it is truly heart-rending to watch how a chicken tries again and again to crawl beneath her fellow-cage mates to search there in vain for cover."

"Ten thousand years ago it was a rare bird confined to small niches of South Asia. Today billions of chickens live on almost every continent and island, bar Antarctica. The domesticated chicken is probably the most widespread bird in the annals of planet Earth. If you measure success in terms of numbers, chickens, cows and pigs are the most successful animals ever. Alas, domesticated species paid for their unparalleled collective success with unprecedented individual suffering."

"Our appetite for meat leads to widespread, horrific cruelty to animals—chickens pressed wing-to-wing into filthy sheds and debeaked, for example. ... These chickens never raise families, root in the soil, build nests, or do anything natural. … Animals have feelings, they suffer; they have needs and desires. They were created by God to breathe fresh air, raise their families, peck in the grass, or root in the soil. Today's farms don't let them do anything God designed them to do. Animal scientists attest that farm animals have personalities and interests, that chickens and pigs can be smarter than dogs and cats. I like that even Jesus identified himself as “a mother hen who longs to gather us under her wings.”"

"I have looked attentively at chickens raised in this battery] fashion, and to me they seem to be unhappy and in poor health. Their combs are dull and lifeless except for glaring and unnatural patches of color that appear occasionally ... The battery chickens I have observed seem to lose their minds about the time they would normally be weaned by their mothers and off in the weeds chasing grasshoppers on their own account. Yes, literally, actually, the battery becomes a gallinaceous madhouse. The eyes of these chickens through the bars gleam like those of maniacs. Let your hand get within reach and it receives a dozen vicious peeks—not the love peck or the tentative peek of idle curiosity bestowed by the normal chicken, but a peck that means business, a peck for flesh and blood, for which in their madness they are thirsting."

"Recently, while I was in the street, my eye was caught by a poulterer's shop; I stared unthinkingly at his piled-up wares, neatly and appetizingly laid out, when I became aware of a man at the side busily plucking a hen, while another man was just putting his hand in a cage, where he seized a live hen and tore its head off. The hideous scream of the animal, and the pitiful, weaker sounds of complaint that it made while being overpowered transfixed my soul with horror. Ever since then I have been unable to rid myself of this impression, although I had experienced it often before."

"Alas! my child, where is the Pen That can do justice to the Hen? Like Royalty, she goes her way, Laying foundations every day, Though not for Public Buildings, yet For Custard, Cake and Omelette. Or if too old for such a use They have their fling at some abuse As when to censure Plays Unfit Upon the stage they make a Hit Or at elections seal the Fate Of an Obnoxious Candidate. No wonder, Child, we prize the Hen, Whose Egg is Mightier than the Pen."

"This gentil cok hadde in his governaunce Sevene hennes, for to doon al his plesaunce, Whiche were his sustres and his paramours, And wonder lyk to him, as of colours. Of whiche the faireste hewed on hir throte Was cleped faire damoysele Pertelote."

"A vet’ran, brave, majestic Cock, Who serv’d for hour glass, guard, and clock, Who crow’d the mansion’s first relief, Alike from goblin and from thief; Whose youth escap’d the Christmas skillet, Whose vigour brav’d the Shrovetide billet."

"Hark, hark! I hear The strain of strutting chanticleer Cry, cock-a-diddle-dow."

"The early village cock Hath twice done salutation to the morn."

"The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn, Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat Awake the god of day."

"The cock with lively din Scatters the rear of darkness thin, And to the stack or the barn door Stoutly struts his dames before."

"The cock’s shrill clarion."

"She hadde a cok, hight Chauntecleer, In al the land of crowing nas his peer. His vois was merier than the mery orgon On messe-dayes that in the chirche gon; Wel sikerer was his crowing in his logge, Than is a clokke, or an abbey orlogge."

"The game-cock dipt and arm’d for fight Does the rising sun affright."