Birdsong Poem by Francis Duggan

Tis not for joy or love of song that the songbird does sing
For those who should know say birdsong is a territorial thing
And those who say birds sing for love may well have got it wrong
For 'twould seem that birds they only have aggression in their song,
The survival in Nature it is played out every day
And like us birds too they go to war it is their natural way
In Nature's own wild kingdom the strongest only thrive
And the weak 'twould seem are doomed from birth they cannot hope to survive,
The bird that you hear sing today has borders to defend
And at nesting time his own kind cannot hope to be his friend
In his voice it is not joy males of his own kind do hear
It is aggression that they hear and of him they live in fear
And tis not for joy or love of song that the songbird does sing
For those who should know say birdsong is a territorial thing.