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Title: Sparrows
Author: John Presland [
More Titles by Presland]
Brown little, fat little, cheerful sparrows!
I like to think, when I hear them chatter,
How, when the brazen noise was gone
Of the chariot-wheels, with the sparks a-scatter,
Their chirp was heard in old Babylon.
In Babylon, and more ancient Memphis,
They chattered and quarrelled, pecked and fumed,
And loved their loves, and flew their ways,
Where the royal Pharaohs lay entombed
Deep from the daylight's vulgar gaze.
Then, just such little homely fellows
(When the angry monarch, terrible,
Watched his curled Assyrians writhe)
They sat, on a carven granite bull
Unheeding of anguish, feathered and blithe.
So did they sit, on the roofs of Rome,
And preen themselves in the morning sun;
And Caesar saw them, brown and grey,
Whisk in the dust, when his course was run
And he took to the Forum his fated way.
Oh, changing time; oh, sun and birds
How little changing. In the Square
This winter morning I have met
Old Egypt's grandson, stopped him there,
And "Sir, you will outlive me yet,"
Said I politely, "mark my words."
[The end]
John Presland's poem: Sparrows
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