A Birthday

My heart is like a singing bird whose nest in a watered shoot;

apple tree whose boughs are bent with thicket 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 vair and purple dyes;

carve 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.