Friends have promised the speaker a spectacular sight: geese rising at sunrise against a glowing sky, their wings audible in the air. The speaker goes early, with Orion and a thin moon still overhead, and the morning begins as described. The sky turns pink, and a pillar of light shoots up. But then clouds thicken, the light "shut[s] down," and the geese, muttering somewhere far off, never lift.
The poem could end in disappointment, but it turns its attention to what is nearby. In the rafters, small birds are waking: a grackle, house sparrows, a young cowbird. The speaker calls their music "unthrilling" and the birds "plain," and the words sound honest rather than scornful. Yet the careful list and the gentle verbs, "shook," "preened," "murmured," show real attention. The mood is quiet and gray, a little let down but also tender. The poem suggests that something worth noticing may be waiting after the expected wonder fails to appear.