“Hear first what I have to say,
And sing, if you have the heart to, then”
I have these lines running through my head, like an ear worm. (I may have misremembered them a little). I used to read quite a lot of poetry, and I think this was from when I was reading poets like Brian Patten, Wendy Cope, Carol Ann Duffy.
I think the poem is about nature, the singing might be birdsong or whale song, and I think it’s the theme is about revealing the true, awful, nature of the world; that the animal that is singing is naive and ignorant and wouldn’t want to sing once they are aware of the reality. It’s got a bit of a William Blake vibe in its cynicism.
It is so frustrating trying to draw it out from my memory!