Do Nightingales still sing

Do Nightingales still sing

In Berkeley Square

It has been a long time since I stopped

To listen.

There are none in Australia

There are songbirds with a tuneful

Rejoinder to the setting sun

There is a Magpie

With an eye on an audition

For the Voice

He has a way of shaking his hips

Like Tom Jones.

It’s not unusual to see him hobnobbing

With a Drongo

Who spends most of his time on the lam

Afraid to be taken seriously

But can carry a tune

Especially in harmonious interaction

With another singer.

I miss the Mute Swan

Although the Black variety

Have their own attributes.

I dream of riding a white one

All the way to Memphis

Where Elvis

Is a Honeyeater

With a penchant

For heartbreak and jailhouse rock

With its calorific content

Written

On the inside.

I remember when they sold birdseed

In Trafalgar Square

Tourists mobbed by pigeons

Nelson daubed in shit,

Until the Mayor banned

The hawkers and costermongers.

Ken Livingstone

Took a hard line

And told them all to skedaddle

Leaving with barely a song or dance

Not a Dick Van Dyke among them.

It is cleaner now,

Quieter

But a little less romantic.

The Hawks are silent

The Falconers, not so much

Starlings sing in a murmur

That is barely audible

Above the noise of traffic.

The Crows care nothing

For history unlike the Raven

Who has clipped its wings

To the old tower.

The Nightingale would struggle

With noise pollution

And would be better heard

In a period drama.

It is where all the old English

Stereotypes come into play

And I guess that’s where

We ought to leave them.