A Birthday by Christina Rossetti

A Birthday

My heart is like a singing bird
Whose nest is in a watered shoot:
My heart is like an apple-tree
Whose boughs are bent with thickset fruit;
My heart is like a rainbow shell
That paddles in a halcyon sea;
My heart is gladder than all these
Because my love is come to me.

Raise me a dais of silk and down;
Hang it with fair and purple dyes;
Cover it in doves and pomegranates,
And peacocks with a hundred eyes;
Work it in gold and silver grapes,
In leaves and silver fleur-de-lys;
Because the birthday of my life
Is come, my love is come to me.

- Christina Rossetti

This poem is about the joy and extravagant celebration of being found at home in the love of God. I love the sense of richness and unrestrained indulgence of the senses depicted here - the sound of singing birds, the color and taste of fruit, the rich colors of rainbows, peacock feathers and rare fabrics, the sensuality of silk and down and the ornamentation of works of gold and silver - nothing is too much to describe her exultant feelings. This is true worship!

This blip, I fear, is a poor imitation of the beauty described here, but the best I could see around me.

A few things I learned from this poem:
'Vair' is a variegated fur, rather like ermine.
Peacocks are traditional symbols of the resurrection.
The poet's brother was a famous pre-Raphaelite painter called Dante Gabriel Rossetti, whose paintings of voluptuous auburn-haired women I love, particularly 'Beata Beatrix' if you care to look it up.

Today is Mayson, my oldest grandson's 8th birthday, so this was an appropriately named poem for him.