[035 SPOKEN ENGLISH CORPUS TEXT H04]
[Time for verse: 'The Linnet's Nest']
[Speaker: Isabel Dean]
[Broadcast notes: Radio 4, 3.47 p.m., November 26th, 1986]

O what has wrought again the miracle of Spring?
This old garden of mine that was so beautiful
And died so utterly - what power of earth or sky
From dead sticks and dead mould has raised up Paradise?

The flow'rs we knew we welcome again in their turns -
Primrose, anemone, daffodil and tulip,
Blossom of cherry, blossom of pear and apple,
Iris and columbine, and now the white cistus.

In a round bush it grows, this cistus of delight,
A mound of delicate pure white crinkled petals,
In the heart of the garden, where the green paths cross,
Where the old stone dial throws its morning shadow.

Come nearer, and speak low; watch while I put aside
This thickly flow'ring spray, and stoop till you can see
There in the shadowy centre, a tiny nest,
And on it, facing us, a bright-eyed bird sitting.

She has five eggs, shaped and speckled most daintily;
But this she cannot know, nor how they are quick'ning
With that which soon will be on the wing, and singing
The ancestral linnet-song of thoughtless rapture.

No, this she cannot know, nor indeed anything
That we call knowledge, nor such love and hope as ours:
Yet she for her treasure will endure and tremble,
And so find peace that passeth our understanding.

You wonder at my wonder - the bird has instinct,
The law by dust ordained for that which dust creates?
What then is beauty? and love? my heart is restless
To know what love and beauty are worth in the end.

The bird I know will fly; nest, brood, cistus, garden
Will all be lost when winter takes the world again:
Yet in my mind their loveliness will survive
Till I too in my turn obey the laws of dust.

Are we then all? Is there no Life in whom our nests,
Our trembling hopes and our unintelligent loves
May still, for the beauty they had, the faith they kept,
Live on as in a vast eternal memory?

Yet so for us would beauty still be meaningless,
Mortal and meaningless - our hearts are restless still
To be one with that spirit from whom all life springs,
And therein to behold all beauty for ever.

Perhaps the linnet too is more than dust: perhaps
She, though so small, of so quick-perishing beauty,
Is none the less a part of His immortal dream
And beneath her breast cherishes the divine life.