The Yellow Canary

The Yellow Canary

C major

Once you were the bully cock Who talked the talk and walked the walk, And every head was turned to hear Your song, your tenor voice so clear.

But now you’re like that little bird You brought down to the mine, inured, Its yellow sacrificial light A lantern in the black of night.

Now you do not sing at all The dust your saved has built a wall Across the warble of the song A swan-song, for it won’t be long.

And all the men who lost their health, They laboured for another’s wealth; They swallowed that neferious dust That gathered round their steel like rust.

Their singing days are over, done; They sit or lie and are quite dumb They wheeze and splutter through the night And hold that sacrificial light.

My love, I hold you in my arms, I listen for that shrill alarm; My injured bird, you’re yellow now The wet dust shining on you brow. I listen now.

— © Frank Callery. June 9th 2016.