Read "The Bird" by Willa Cather online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
"BIRDIE, Birdie, will you pet?
Summer-time is far away yet, / You'll have silken quilts and a velvet bed, / And a pillow of satin for your head!"
"I'd rather sleep in the ivy wall; / No rain comes through, tho' I hear it fall; / The sun peeps gay at dawn of day, / And I sing, and wing away, away!"
"O Birdie, Birdie, will you pet?
Diamond-stones and amber and jet / We'll string for a necklace fair and fine / To please this pretty bird of mine!"
"O thanks for diamonds, and thanks for jet, / But here is something daintier yet, -- / A feather-necklace round and round, / That I wouldn't sell for a thousand pound!"
"O Birdie, Birdie, won't you pet?
We'll buy you a dish of silver fret, / A golden cup and an ivory seat, / And carpets soft beneath your feet!"
"Can running water be drunk from gold?
Can a silver dish the forest hold?
A rocking twig is the finest chair, / And the softest paths lie through the air, -- / Good-bye, good-bye to my lady fair! "