Ten of the best songbirds in poetry

At the Guardian John Mullan named ten of the best songbirds in poetry.

One songbird on the list:

Amy Clampitt's hermit thrush

At the summer solstice, the poet and her companion wander across some "low-tide-uncovered isthmus" for a somewhat gloomy picnic, until a burst of birdsong snaps them out of it. "We drop everything to listen as a / hermit thrush distills its fragmentary, / hesitant, in the end / unbroken music".

Read about another songbird on the list.

Read--or listen to the author read--"A Hermit Thrush" by Amy Clampitt.

--Marshal Zeringue