The willows aren't alive until the warblers arrive

A draft:

The willows aren't alive until the warblers arrive
encouraging the flowers to burst from their buds,
and Black Brook is empty without a pair of dippers
chirring down its course,
and the moors are more desolate without larks
singing down like the sun.

This absence of conversation,
the stony silence of your back
as it steadily mounts the track,
causes me to fall further and further behind
until I politely take a different path.

Photo of Willow Warbler by Dave F Barker http://www.holidays-revealed.com