Or the near grasshopper's incessant note,
That snug beneath the wall in comfort sits,
And chirping imitates the silvery chink
Of wages told into the ploughman's palm--
Or gentle curlew bidding kind good night
To the spent villager, or ere his hand
The cottage taper quench-or grazing ox
His dewy supper from the savoury herb
Audibly gathering-or cheerful hind
From the lov'd harvest feast returning home,
Whistling at intervals some rustic air.
Such rural sounds,
If haply notic'd by the musing mind,
Sweet interruption yield, and thrice improve
The solemn luxury of idle thought.
If not abroad I sit, but sip at home
The cheering beverage of fading eve,
By some fair hand, or ere it reach the lip,
With mingled flavour tinctur'd of the cane
And Asiatic leaf, let the mute flock,
As from the window studious looks mine eye,
Steal fold-ward nibbling o'er the shadowy down—
Let the reluctant milch-kine of the farm
Wend slowly from the pasture to the pail.
Let the glad ox, unyok'd, make haste to field,
And the stout wain-horse, of encumbrance stript,
Shake his enormous limbs with blund'ring speed,
Eager to gratify his famish'd lip
With taste of herbage and the meadow-brook.
THE gorse is yellow on the heath,
The banks with speedwell flowers are gay,
The oaks are budding; and beneath,
The hawthorn soon will bear the wreath,
The silver wreath of May.
The welcome guest of settled Spring,
The Swallow, too, is come at last;
Just at sunset, when thrushes sing,
I saw her dash with rapid wing,
And hail'd her as she pass'd.
Come, summer visitant, attach
To my reed-roof your nest of clay, And let my ear your music catch, Low twittering underneath the thatch, At the grey dawn of day.
As fables tell, an Indian Sage,
The Hindustani woods among,
Could in his desert hermitage,
As if 'twere mark'd in written page,
Translate the wild bird's song.
I wish I did his power possess,
That I might learn, fleet bird, from thee,
What our vain systems only guess,
And know from what wild wilderness
You came across the sea.
I would a little while restrain
Your rapid wing, that I might hear
Whether on clouds that bring the rain,
You sail'd above the western main,
The wind your charioteer.
In Afric, does the sultry gale,
Through spicy bower, and palmy grove,
Bear the repeated Cuckoo's tale?
Dwells there a time, the wandering Rail,
Or the itinerant Dove?
Were you in Asia? O relate,
If there your fabled sister's woes
She seem'd in sorrow to narrate;
Or sings she but to celebrate
Her nuptials with the rose?
I would inquire how, journeying long
The vast and pathless ocean o'er,
You ply again those pinions strong,
And come to build anew among
The scenes you left before;
But if, as cooler breezes blow,
Prophetic of the waning year,
You hide, though none know when or how, In the cliff's excavated brow,
And linger torpid here;
Thus lost to life, what favouring dream
Bids you to happier hours awake;
And tells, that dancing in the beam,
The light gnat hovers o'er the stream,
The May-fly on the lake?
Or if, by instinct taught to know
Approaching dearth of insect food,
To isles and willowy aits you go,
And crowding on the pliant bough,
Sink in the dimpling flood:
How learn ye, while the cold waves boom
Your deep and oosy couch above,
The time when flowers of promise bloom,
And call you from your transient tomb,
To light, and life, and love?
Alas! how little can be known,
Her sacred veil where Nature draws;
Let baffled Science humbly own,
Her mysteries understood alone
By HIM who gives her laws.
SONNET WRITTEN AT THE CLOSE OF SPRING.
THE garlands fade that Spring so lately wove,
Each simple flower, which she had nurs'd in dew,
Anemones, that spangled every grove,
The primrose wan, and harebell mildly blue.
No more shall violets linger in the dell,
Or purple orchis variegate the plain,
Till Spring again shall call forth every bell,
And dress with humid hands her wreaths again.
Ah, poor humanity! so frail, so fair,
Are the fond visions of thy early day,
Till tyrant passion, and corrosive care,
Bid all thy fairy colours fade away!
Another May new buds and flowers shall bring ;
Ah! why has happiness no second spring?
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