A Song Of Winter Poem by Francis Duggan

The sun doesn't shine by day and few birds in song
And the nights are dark and wet and cold and long
And like the weather the clouds of my heart gray
And Spring at least almost three months away.

I have not seen the swallows for two weeks or more
In distant sunlit sky they wheel and soar
But they will return to their native hills in Spring
And willy wagtail on fence post will sing.

The forest shrouded in a cloak of gray
And the currawongs are calling all the day
These crow like birds who keep telling us of rain
Repeat the same notes over and again.

I envy welcome swallow his great joy
O'er distant sunlit paddocks he can fly
When Winter come towards sunny clime he wing
And return to his mountain in the Spring.

The sun doesn't shine and the swallows miles away
And the currawongs are calling all the day
And cloak of Winter shroud the wooded hill
And magpie's voice has grown a little shrill.