CHAPTER III

THE BIRDS OF THE POETS

" "He shall cover thee with thy feathers,
And under his wings shalt thou trust."

-DAVID.

POETRY might be defined roughly as the most appealing manner in which a thought that touches the heart can be expressed. The connecting link between the birds and the poets is very strong. Feathered creatures have a beauty of form and motion, a sweetness of song, a defencelessness against the elements, a wonderful ability in nest-building, a faithfulness in brooding, a fearlessness in defending their young, an attachment to their frail homes, and a devotion to each other that marks them as the especial property of the poets. There is in bird-life a constant appeal to our affection and sympathy, and continual comparison is suggested between their life processes and ours. We love the birds, and whoever writes of them with a touch of the divine tenderness of poesy makes instant appeal to our hearts.

Long before exquisite thought had been harnessed and worked down to a thing of rhyme, meter, and carefully measured feet, the historians of the Bible were making the very essence of poetic expression on many subjects. On none did their particular genius soar higher than when writing of the birds, or using some of their habits or attributes in comparison with men. These poets of the dawn knew little about measuring their words into symmetrical periods and covering a page with graceful rhymes to express a single thought. They conceived their poetic idea, and then studied to strip it of every unnecessary word, in order to present the naked thought more prominently. Our rhyming and jingling may be soothing and musical, but who in these days offers you a thought clothed

in the refined utterance and with the majestic expression of the ancient poets?

The covers of the Bible are almost bursting with the most forceful poems expressed in as clear-cut utterance as was ever conceived by man. Wonderful volumes could be made of chosen examples, but in this chapter I must of necessity confine myself as closely as I can to the birds (which is an admission that I am not able to do so entirely). I find parts that demand to be given place.

In the days when life was comparatively simple, as contrasted with the complications of modern cities, business, politics, and social usages and customs, men lived very near the earth, and so nature touched them closely and taught them largely, as is proven by the books of David and Isaiah. Every instant of comprehension of nature brought them closer in touch with the Almighty Force behind it, so that the Spirit was in every utterance they made, and poetry throbbed in their brains as blood pulsed in their hearts.

Moses could not write the books of generations, record the history of the exodus, and lay down the laws of government without here and there breaking into poetry. When this work was accomplished, in the last of Deuteronomy, he reached a culmination, and sang for the Children of Israel the songs of Moses and the Lamb. Once, "in the ears of all the assembly of Israel," Moses recited the song of "The Lord our Rock." It commences:

"Give ear, ye heavens, and I will speak;

And let the earth hear the words of my mouth:
My doctrine shall drop as the rain,

My speech shall distil as the dew;

As the small rain upon the tender grass,

And as the showers upon the herb:

For I will proclaim the name of our Lord:
Ascribe ye greatness unto our God."

With such a beginning it is easy to see how Moses, in pouring out his heart at the close of life, reached a climax of impassioned utterance in this poem that leaves it standing monumental in the literature of nations.

This thought of Moses, that he wished his teachings

to refresh his people as the small rain upon the tender grass" in the great spring rejuvenation of the whole earth, suggests the Spring Song of Solomon, but they are different. Moses described spring in comparison; Solomon celebrated the season. His song is found in that chapter beginning with the incomparable lines:

"I am a rose of Sharon,
A lily of the valleys.

As a lily among thorns,

So is my love among the daughters.

As the apple among the trees of the wood,

So is my beloved among the sons.

I sat down under his shadow with great delight,
And his fruit was sweet to my taste.

He brought me to the banqueting house,

And his banner over me was love."

These lines appeal to me as so perfect that any attempt at improvement would be sacrilege. They prepare one for the cloud-covered heights touched constantly by the genius of Solomon. He continued the chapter in alternating dialogue as between a bridegroom and bride, making their words celebrate the glory and the calling of the Church; then to the bride he assigned the Spring Song, and he must have been thinking of Lebanon with its sweet airs, fragrant spices, flowers, fruit trees, and song birds.

"For, lo, the winter is past,
The rain is over and gone;

The flowers appear on the earth;

The time of the singing of birds is come,

And the voice of the turtle is heard in our land;
The fig tree ripeneth her green figs,

And the vines are in blossom,

They give forth their fragrance."

Then Solomon in a song, addressed the Almighty as

if He were a dove:

"O my dove,

That art in the clefts of the rock,

In the covert of the steep place,

Let me see thy countenance,

Let me hear thy voice,

For sweet is thy voice,

And thy countenance is comely."

In this manner the attributes of the beautiful rock dove, that nested in shelving granite and wild places, served to portray the Creator. And a little later, in an attempt to materialize Jehovah, this poet twice used the birds:

"My beloved is white and ruddy,
The chiefest among ten thousand.
His head is as the most fine gold,

His locks are bushy, and black as a raven.

His eyes are like doves beside the water brooks;
Washed with milk and fitly set.

His cheeks are as a bed of spices,
As banks of sweet herbs."

This I consider unsurpassed of its kind. Solomon was so very great he never amplified his thought until he lost it. Just a few clear outlines sufficed, and literature never sustained greater loss than that we have handed down to us only so few of the one thousand and five poems he recorded that he wrote. His comparisons and poetic imagery never have been equalled. Throughout his songs the most striking lines greet us and, after these thousands of years, set our hearts singing. He was a master of the art of encompassing a poem in a line, as were the ancients of many nations.

Take for example that vessel previously mentioned, that was found in the pyramids. On the bottom was written in Chinese this poem, clear cut and concise as the stroke of a skilled surgeon:

For, lo, the spring is here!

All of the showers and flowers, bowers and hours, that could be strung together to tell of April cloud, tree gold, flower bloom, migrating birds, bleating lamb, and babbling brook, could do no more than to suggest to us a small part of the complete glory of the rejuvenation of the earth; then why struggle with it? Oceans of words can tell us nothing new or different from that which we were born to enjoy once every season. The least suggestion of any part of that picture instantly conjures the whole of it; then why not content ourselves with merely, "For, lo, the spring is here!"

Historians tell us that when a Chinese poet achieves a gem like that he goes out alone and sits silently before the most exquisite spectacle in nature possible to him, and worships his genius. Small wonder! Any one who can eliminate words, dispense with rhymes, and yet put his soul into his theme until it lives century after century, has genius, not only for his own, but for the whole world's worship. Perhaps Bible poets were just a trifle more verbose than the Chinese, but the examples they set us are such as those poetically inclined might follow prayerfully. The history of the world does not produce greater poets nor stylists to equal Solomon, David, Job, and Isaiah. Allow these complete poems of Solomon to represent him in comparison with like work from any country: We will remember thy love more than wine." Many waters can not quench love."

"

"

Thy lips, O my bride, drop as the honeycomb."
For, lo, the winter is past!

"

My beloved is mine, and I am his."

Then, in one great poetic outburst, such lines as these combined in one of the masterpieces of all time :

"Set me as a seal upon thine heart,
As a seal upon thine arm:

For love is as strong as death;

Jealousy is as cruel as the grave;

The flashes thereof are flashes of fire,

A very flame of the Lord.

Many waters can not quench love,

Neither can the floods drown it:

If a man would give all the substance of his
house for love,

It would utterly be contemned."

David was equally as great a poet as Solomon, but there was a wide difference in their style. The very thought of Solomon was coloured by his riches and power. His writings were not only touched with the scarlet and gold of royal life, but they pulsed hot with the heartblood of a strong and lusty man. To a great extent all Bible scenes had an outdoor background. The lines of Solomon are like a field of ripe wheat thickly set with purple poppies and crimson lilies.