Classic Poem

Coy in a covert of the glossy bracken
My love and I sat warm, enchanted, silent,
And watched one tree against the molten azure;

Its leaves were fretted gold-work in the sunset,
And on a bough that glistered like vermilion,
A roseate bird of paradise sat preening.

Alas! my love arose and went in anger:
The east wind blew, and all the sky grew leaden,
The bloom and gloss from off the bracken faded.

And, in the hueless larch that I was watching,
On one brown branch, caught by the storms and broken,
Still sat and preened a common songless fieldfare.