Bird on the bare branch,
flinging your frail song
on the bleak air,
tenuous and brave –
like love in a bleak world,
and like love,
pierced
with everlastingness!
O praise
that we too
may be struck through with light,
may shatter the barren cold
with pure melody
and sing
for thy sake
till the hills are lit with love
and the deserts come
to bloom.
~Jane Tyson Clement from The Heart’s Necessities

Birdsong starts around 4:15 AM these days – at first gentle twittering and chirping in the near-dark becoming a full-throated Hallelujah chorus as the sun overcomes the horizon.

Visitors to our farm can’t quite get used to waking to the birds tuning up loudly every morning when this insistent symphony is launched. It is impossible to ignore by diving under the blankets and covering our head with pillows — nor should we.

I for one appreciate the reminder we should wake up singing to the glory of the sunrise. The light has returned. That is surely something to shout about.