Winged

I met him with a friend in Piccadilly,

And sleek he was as a blackbird in May.

I liked his flutter, for though seeming silly

To me, a foreigner, it made me gay.

He'd bob his head and wag his little cane

To mark the happy aptness of a word

Among his throaty twitterings-inane

Yet musical, and so the less absurd.

I threw a jest, American in sense.

He seized it dubiously with a qualm,

His eyes a little troubled and intense,

As if he gulped a sweet but lively worm.

So light a thing! Yet when War struck his land,

They found that heaven's inhospitable blue

Was an arena where he dared command.

And he was feared and honored when he flew.