"It's my idee," a blackbird said,
  As he sat in a mulberry bush,
"It's my idee, it seems to me,
  I can warble as well as a thrush."

"Let 'er go, let 'er go," said a carrion crow,
  As he swung on an old clothesline,
"For I won't budge, but I'll act as judge,
  And the winner I'll ask to dine."

In a minor key the thrush sang he, .
  'Way up in an elm remote,
And twice and thrice like paradise
  Songs welled from the warbler's throat.
 
Then a rooster he, in his usual glee,
  Flew up on the barnyard fence,
And he crowed and he crowed; then he said :
  "I'll be blowed
If that isn't simply immense."

Then the blackbird, well, he listened a spell
  And began in garrulous run,
But he wasn't admired, for a farmer tired—
  Well, he up and fired a gun.

Then the black crow said, as he rested his head:
  "I want to go somewhere and die."
And a young cock-a-too said: "I do, too,"
  And a parrot said : "So do I."