Explore "The Blinded Bird" by Thomas Hardy on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
SO zestfully canst thou sing? / And all this indignity, / With God's consent, on thee! / Blinded ere yet a-wing / By the red-hot needle thou, / I stand and wonder how / So zestfully thou canst sing!
Resenting not such wrong, / Thy grievous pain forgot, / Eternal dark thy lot, / Groping thy whole life long; / After that stab of fire; / Enjailed in pitiless wire; / Resenting not such wrong!
Who hath charity? This bird. / Who suffereth long and is kind, / Is not provoked, though blind / And alive ensepulchred? / Who hopeth, endureth all things? / Who thinketh no evil, but sings? / Who is divine? This bird.