The First Singer

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D. C. · Mar 30, 1911

We heard a bluebird singing; the song was magic-sweet; He swung upon the lilac, the snow was round his feet, The wind blew roughly o’er him, the sky was steely gray; But yet he perched there singing the chilling gloom away.

Brave traveler from the southland, perhaps you came too soon; For ice still binds the streamlets, the sun is wan at noon; The violets are sleeping close in their earthy bed, And not a greening ’blade of grass has dared to show its head.

But O, we’re glad to greet you, sweet harbinger of spring! No sound was e’er so welcome as your gay caroling, Courageous little songster, upon the leafless spray, A-singing and a-singing our weariness away!

— Farm Journal.