The Battle of the Birds

I heard the fight of the birds, Their wings smote the air With whistlings and cries, And their wild disturbed motions, Circling and darting, fraught With the frenzy of wing, shattering the sun,
Through thickest green, through the scent of the trees,

Fates of Summer, their fates! I saw their tiny things drift Like leaves towards the grass, With such a frenzy of edged air, Flesh of feathers! Gone, and Fates of Summer, their fates!

• Lesbia Harford