Fond fancies! wheresoe'er shall turn thine eye
On earth, air, ocean, or the starry sky,
Converse with Nature in pure sympathy;

All vain desires, all lawless wishes quelled,
Be Thou to love and praise alike impelled,
Whatever boon is granted or withheid.

XVIII

TO A SKY-LARK

ETHEREAL minstrel! pilgrim of the sky!
Dost thou despise the earth where cares abound?
Or, while the wings aspire, are heart and eye
Both with thy nest upon the dewy ground?
Thy nest which thou canst drop into at will,
Those quivering wings composed, that music still!

Leave to the nightingale her shady wood;
A privacy of glorious light is thine;

Whence thou dost pour upon the world a flood
Of harmony, with instinct more divine;

Type of the wise who soar, but never roam ;

True to the kindred points of Heaven and Home!

XIX

THE GREEN LINNET

BENEATH these fruit-tree boughs that shed
Their snow-white blossoms on my head,
With brightest sunshine round me spread
Of spring's unclouded weather,

In this sequestered nook how sweet
To sit upon my orchard-seat!

And birds and flowers once more to greet,
My last year's friends together.

One have I marked, the happiest guest
In all this covert of the blest :

Hail to Thee, far above the rest

In joy of voice and pinion! Thou, Linnet! in thy green array, Presiding Spirit here to-day,

Dost lead the revels of the May;

And this is thy dominion.

While birds, and butterflies, and flowers,
Make all one band of paramours,
Thou, ranging up and down the bowers,
Art sole in thy employment:

A Life, a Presence like the Air,
Scattering thy gladness without care,
Too blest with any one to pair ;

Thyself thy own enjoyment.

Amid yon tuft of hazel trees,
That twinkle to the gusty breeze,
Behold him perched in ecstacies,

Yet seeming still to hover;
There where the flutter of his wings
Upon his back and body flings
Shadows and sunny glimmerings,
That cover him all over.

My dazzled sight he oft deceives,
A Brother of the dancing leaves;
Then flits, and from the cottage-eaves
Pours forth his song in gushes;

As if by that exulting strain

He mocked and treated with disdain
The voiceless Form he chose to feign,
While fluttering in the bushes.

1803

XX

O NIGHTINGALE! thou surely art

A creature of a 'fiery heart' :

These notes of thine-they pierce and pierce;
Tumultuous harmony and fierce!

Thou sing'st as if the God of wine

Had helped thee to a Valentine;

A song in mockery and despite

Of shades, and dews, and silent night;
And steady bliss, and all the loves
Now sleeping in these peaceful groves.

I heard a Stock-dove sing or say
His homely tale, this very day;
His voice was buried among trees,
Yet to be come-at by the breeze :

He did not cease; but cooed—and cooed;
And somewhat pensively he wooed :
He sang of love, with quiet blending,
Slow to begin, and never ending;
Of serious faith, and inward glee;
That was the song-the song for me!

XXI

TO THE CUCKOO

O BLITHE New-comer! I have heard,

I hear thee and rejoice.

O Cuckoo shall I call thee Bird,

Or but a wandering Voice?

While I am lying on the grass

Thy twofold shout I hear,
From hill to hill it seems to pass,

At once far off, and near.

1806

Though babbling only to the Vale,
Of sunshine and of flowers,

Thou bringest unto me a tale

Of visionary hours.

Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring!

Even yet thou art to me

No bird, but an invisible thing,

A voice, a mystery ;

The same whom in my school-boy days I listened to; that Cry

Which made me look a thousand ways
In bush, and tree, and sky.

To seek thee did I often rove
Through woods and on the green;
And thou wert still a hope, a love ;
Still longed for, never seen.

And I can listen to thee yet ;

Can lie upon the plain

And listen, till I do beget

That golden time again.

O blessed Bird! the earth we pace
Again appears to be

An unsubstantial, faery place;

That is fit home for Thee!