The Plea of the Shot Swallow

In Teos once, bedewed with odours fine,
The happy dove slept on his master's lyre;
A little homeless swallow clings to mine,
A spirit-bird — he looks for something higher
Than songs and odours; pity and remorse
He claims — an elegy of words and tears:
He asks me why they swept him from his peers,
When wheeling gaily in his wondrous course;
And now he comes, with trembling wings, to plead
For some brief record of his cruel fate;
Some note of tuneful sorrow for the deed
Which struck him from the side of his dear mate.
Poor bird! had I the Teian's melody,
Sweet as his dainty Ode thy dirge should be.