bird

I read, and sigh, and wish I were a tree; For sure then I should grow To fruit or shade: at least some bird would trust Her household to me, and I should be just.

—Herbert, George

Father in Heaven, whenthethoughtof Thee wakesinour hearts, let it not awaken like a frightened bird that flies about in dismay, but like a child waking from its sleep with a heavenly smile.

—Kierkegaard, So«  ren Aabye

You see, family life is all the life she knows: she's like a bird bornina cage, that would dieif you let it looseinthe woods.

—Shaw, George Bernard

Curse not the king, no not in thy thought; and curse not the rich in thy bedchamber: for a bird of the air shall carry the voice, and that which hath wings shall tell the matter.

—Bible (Old Testament)

The bird onthebranch, thelily inthemeadow, thestag in the forest, the fish in the sea, the countless joyful creatures sing,God is Love. But beneath all these sopranos, as it were a sustained bass part, is the De profundis of the Sacrificed,God is Love.

—Kierkegaard, So«  ren Aabye

Sweet bird that shunn'st the noise of folly, Most musical, most melancholy!

—Milton,John

And hear the pleasant cuckoo, loud and longö The simple bird that thinks two notes a song.

—Davies,W(illiam) H(enry)

Hail to thee, blithe Spirit! Bird thou never wert, That from Heaven, or near it, Pourest thy full heart In profuse strains of unpremeditated art.

—Shelley, Percy Bysshe

   A gun gives you the body, not the bird.

—Thoreau, Henry David

And sad,Oh sad, that glen with one thin stream He met his death in; and a farmer told me There was but one small bird to shoot: it sang 'Better Beast and know your end, and die Than Man with murderous angels in his head.'

—Devlin, Denis

The cheerful bird of youth flutters awayö I hardly noticed how it came or went.

—Khayya¤ m , Omar

Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!

—Keats,John

So this is what our lives have been given to find, A language that can serve our purposes, A marvellous lucidity, a quality of fieryaery light, Flowing like clear water, flying like a bird Burning like a sunlit landscape.

—Grieve

Oh there is blessing in this gentle breeze, Avisitant that while it fans my cheek Doth seem half conscious of the joy it brings From the green fields, and from yon azure sky. Whate'er its mission, the soft breeze can come To none more grateful than to me; escaped From the vast city, where I long had pined A discontented sojourner: now free, Free as a bird to settle where I will.

—Wordsworth,William

The Iraqi is really not whacky Toady, perhaps, even tacky. When they gave him the word He gave us the bird And joined with the Arabs, by cracky!

—Acheson, Dean Gooderham

Go, go, go, said the bird: human kind Cannot bear very much reality.

—Eliot,T(homas) S(tearns)

Mairg an t-so' i l a ch |' air fairge ian mo¤ r  marbh na h-albann. Pity the eye that sees on the ocean the great dead bird of Scotland.

—MacLean, Sorley Gaelic name Somhairle MacGill-Eain

I know why the caged bird sings!

—Dunbar, Paul Laurence

World, world, I cannot get thee close enough! Long have I known a glory in it all, But never knew like this; Here such a pattern is As stretcheth me apart. Lord, I do fear Thou'st made the world too beautiful this year: My soul is all but out of meölet fall No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call.

—Millay, Edna St Vincent

Morning has broken Like the first morning, Blackbird has spoken Like the first bird. Praise for the singing! Praise for the morning! Praise for them springing Fresh from the Word!

—Farjeon, Eleanor

   L'amour est un oiseau rebelle Que nul ne peut apprivoiser. Love's a bird that will live in freedom That no man ever learned to tame.

—Meilhac, Henri

There's Carol like a rolling car, And Martin like a flying bird, And Adam like the Lord's First Word, And Raymond like the Harvest Moon, And Peter like a piper's tune, And Alan like the flowing on Of water. And there's John, like John.

—Farjeon, Eleanor

And hark! the Nightingale begins its song, 'Most musical, most melancholy' bird! A melancholy bird?†his song Should make all Nature lovelier, and itself Be loved like Nature!

—Coleridge, Samuel Taylor

Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring Even yet thou are to me No bird, but an invisible thing, Avoice, a mystery.

—Wordsworth,William

I will make you brooches and toys for your delight Of bird-song at morning and star-shine at night. I will make a palace fit for you and me Of green days in forests and blue days at sea. I will make my kitchen, and you shall keep your room, Where white flows the river and bright blows the broom, And you shall wash your linen and keep your body white In rainfall at morning and dewfall at night.

—Stevenson, Robert Louis

O lyric love half angel and half bird And all a wonder and a wild desire.

—Browning, Robert

At Flores in the Azores Sir Richard Grenville lay, And a pinnace, like a fluttered bird, came flying from far away: 'Spanishships of warat sea! Wehavesighted fifty-three!' Then sware Lord Thomas Howard: ''Fore God I am no coward; But I cannot meetthem here, for my ships are out of gear, And the half my men are sick. I must fly, but followquick. Wearesix ships oftheline; canwefight withfifty-three?' Then spake Sir Richard Grenville: 'I know you are no coward; You fly them for a moment to fight with them again. But I've ninety men and more that are lying sick ashore. I should count myself the coward if I left them, my Lord Howard, To these Inquisition dogs and the devildoms of Spain.' So Lord Howard passed away with five ships of war that day, Till he melted like a cloud in the silent summer heaven.

—Tennyson

   When you have shot one bird flying you have shot all birds flying. Theyare all different and they fly in different ways but the sensation is the same and the last one is as good as the first.

—Hemingway, Ernest Millar

La cruaute¤  , bien loin d'e"  tre un vice, est le premier sentiment qu'imprime en nous la nature; l'enfant brise son hochet, mord le te¤  ton de sa nourrice, e¤  trangle son oiseau, bien avant que d'avoir l'a"  ge de raison. Far from being a vice, cruelty is the primary feeling that nature imprints in us. The infant breaks its rattle, bites its nurse's nipple, and strangles a bird, well before reaching the age of reason.

—Sade, Donatien Alphonse Fran c° ois, Marquis de

The bird, the beste, the fisch eke in the see, They lyve in fredome, euerich in his kynd, And I, a man, and lakkith libertee!

—James I

L'Oiseau bleu. The Blue Bird.

—Maeterlinck, Maurice

My first impression is of a slightly bearded spinster: my second isof Willie King madeup like Philip II: my thirdof some thin little bird, peeking, crooked, reserved, violent and timid. 614

—Nicolson, Sir Harold

The point is the seeingöthe grace beyond recognition, the ways of the bird rising, unnamed, unknown, beyond the range of language, beyond its noun. Eyes open on growing, flying, happening, and go on opening. Manifold, the world dawns on unrecognizing, realizing eyes. Amazement is the thing. Not love, but the astonishment of loving.

—Reid, Alastair

It's a warm wind, the west wind, full of bird's cries; I never hear the west wind but tears are in my eyes.

—Masefield,John Edward

   Say, has some wet bird-haunted English lawn Lent it the music of its trees at dawn?

—Arnold, Matthew

   What bird so sings, yet so does wail? O 'tis the ravished nightingale. Jug, jug, jug, jug, tereu, she cries, And still her woes at midnight rise.

—Lyly,John

All night has the casement jessamine stirred To the dancers dancing in tune; Till a silence fell with the waking bird, And a hush with the setting moon.

—Tennyson

Love without hope, as when the young bird-catcher Swept off his tall hat to the Squire's own daughter, So let the imprisoned larks escape and fly Singing about her head, as she rode by.

—Graves, Robert von Ranke