New Delhi, Feb. 13 -- When a bird sings, it is not performing for us. It is speaking to the world it belongs to. - David Abram

In Act 3, Scene 5 of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, the lovers spend the night together after their secret wedding. It is here that their first argument unfolds. Romeo prepares to leave after hearing a birdcall, assuming it to be the rising call of a lark. Juliet insists that it is not yet daybreak. She tells him that he has mistaken the nightingale's song for that of the lark. Romeo, however, remains certain that it is the lark announcing the morning.

The difference between the nightingale and the lark is as vast and as narrow as night and day. These birds mark the duality of the lovers' relationship: union an...