Bless the Lord all birds of the air...The little Benedictine bird, in her black feathers, has just sung one of the Hours.

This morning I was awakened by the song of the Thrush commonly called the Blackbird. Like the American Robin, Turdus migratorius, this Turdus merula is a harbinger of Spring, and both birds are among my favorites for their early morning choral melodies. The songs of the Blackbirds and American Robins, to me, are part of Vigils, the early morning Hours or, technically, Night Hours, before Lauds, said in monastic settings much earlier than the 6:30 hour at which I heard the singing. The Blackbird sings in the dark, before dawn, whereas the American Robin sings just as Dawn arrives. When I lived in Missouri, I heard hundreds of Robins in the Dawn. This morning, the moon was shining while the Blackbird sang.


This bird reminds me in turn of one of Shakespeare's craziest and most humorous play, A Midsummer Night's Dream in which the Blackbird is mentioned. As I have aged, I have warmed up to this play more and more, as it shows the "battle of the sexes" as well as the unity of love which crosses and crisscrosses our paths in a multiple of manners. The entire story is framed in the harmony of marriage, as opposed to the disharmony of courtship and carnal love. As Valentine's Day approaches, (and I started this little series of meditations on love, and included chickens below), I now acknowledge the small, but growing Morning Chorus as sign of our love and all creation's love for God, our prayers going "up like incense before the Lord" in the darkness just before dawn, rather than in the evening, as the psalmist states. Vigils takes the place of Matins in the more traditional orders, whereas in some breviaries, Matins and Lauds are combined. Here is a quotation from St. Benedict: As the Prophet saith: "Seven times a day I have given praise to Thee,"this sacred seven fold number will be fulfilled by us in this wise if we perform the duties of our service at the time of Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers, and Compline; because it was of these day hours that he hath said: "Seven times a day I have given praise to Thee." For the same Prophet saith of the night watches: "At midnight I arose to confess to Thee." At these times, therefore, let us offer praise to our Creator "for the judgments of His justice;" namely, at Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers, and Compline; and let us rise at night to praise Him.


The little Benedictine bird, in her black feathers, has just sung one of the Hours.