It returns to the same nest. The watcher lies
Beneath spring brushwood to await its coming –
At watch so long he dreams himself becoming
Less than himself and more, the landscape’s eyes.
Though far beyond his eyes, beyond the range
Of field-glasses, he knows it breaks no bonds:
Its instinct to his knowledge corresponds,
What is there in a small bird’s blood that learns
To plot its course by sun and stars, being drawn
Yearly toward a lost, remembered dawn?
The watcher broods on this. The bird returns.
And all its colours flash where he attends –
A deep blue mantling rust and white. It sings
Caged in his retina; then on curving wings
Veers off to vanish where the human ends.