Page:Poems, Volume 1, Coates, 1916.djvu/28



HE oriole sang in the apple tree;

The sick girl lay on her bed, and heard

The tremulous note of the glad wild bird;

And, "Ah!" she sighed, "to share with thee

Life's rapture exquisite and strong:

Its hope, its eager energy,

Its fragrance and its song!"

The oriole swayed in the apple tree,

And he sang: "I will build, with my love, a nest,

Fine as e'er welcomed a birdling guest:

Like a pendant blossom, secure yet free,

It shall hang from the bough above me there,

Bright, bright with the gold that is combed for me

From the sick girl's auburn hair!"

So he built the nest in the apple tree;

And, burnished over, a ball of light,

It gleamed and shone in the sick girl's sight,

And she gazed upon it wonderingly: