The Birds-nester

Critic, that hoary Gull, in air

Whistles, whistles shrilly:

Climbing Youth, beware

Murder and mockery!

That wheeling, hoary gull

Bats on his thin skull,

Claws at his steady eyes,

Whinnies and cries:

Youth flings the gibe back.

Hundreds of wings clack,

Bright eyes encircle, search

For foothold's fatal lurch.

‘ See now he shifts his grip:

Loosen each finger-tip!

Whew, brothers, shall he slip?’

Crack-tendoned, answers Youth

‘ I seek for Eggs of Truth.’

Claws clutch his hair,

Beaks prick his eyes —

‘ Whistle, Despair, Despair!

With ancient quills prise

Every hand's — foot's — hold,

Wedged in the rock's fold!

Batter and scream, bewilder

This impious babel-buil... whew!

Down he is rocketing falling twisting.’

For days and nights

Time's curly breakers

Winnow him, wash him...

What is that stirs?

What wing from the heights

Slants to that murdered limb?

Gull's peering eye bath spotted

Something the sea has rotted.

Secretly to the feast

Dives big gull, less, and least;

For Age never dies:

Age shall pick out his eyes,

Taste them with critick zest,

— Age knows the Best!

— Age shall build his lair

Out of his hair:

Gulp his small splintered bones

To his gizzard, for stones:

Feed on his words

All his young woolly birds.

Say not he died in vain!

All that he cried in pain

Ear-cocked Age hearkens to

Someday. Declares it true

Someday.

What though he fell? The jest

Feathers old Critic's nest.