The Old Nest Poem by Robert Kirkland Kernighan

There 's an old nest down in the branches

That under my windows swing,
Where once in the long sweet evenings

Two mocking birds used to sing ;

But winter has battered and tattered
That nest near my window pane :

As spring-time freshens I often wonder,
Will the mocking birds come again

Return to the nest that they loved so well
And built with such cunning care

The nest that they changed to a golden cup
With wisps of my loved one's hair?

It seems to wait when the evenings fall,
And watch when the mornings burn ;
And say, when the branches my windows tap,
' Will the mocking birds never return ?'

But the nest will fall as our hopes will fall,

And the loves of the long ago
Will never return to the trysting place

The place that had loved them so.

At lonesome eve and at lovely morn,
We watch, with a growing pain,

For the faces sweet and the tinkling feet
That never will come again.