Mild melodist! whose artless note,

At foggy eve, at chilly morn,

From nature's quiet haunts remote,

Here seems a harmony forlorn;

Fain would I give thee, for thy song,

A carol simple as thy own;

For thou, sweet bird! awak’st a throng

Of thoughts which rise for thee alone.

It is not that thy lay is fraught

With music, like the sky-lark's strain,

Or nightingale’s, so sweetly caught

By listening ear, in midnight's reign;

Nor has thy note that deeper sound,

Of which my heart has felt the thrall,

When I have heard, from groves profound,

The lone wood-pigeon's frequent call.

But these, each one, and all, give vent

To song, where song is wont to flow;

Thou, thou art sweetly eloquent,

With nothing near to wake that glow

Of music, in the haunts of men,

Which, amid buildings cluster’d round,

From time to time arrests my pen,

And makes me listen to its sound.

Oh! hearts that feel, and eyes that see

All as it truly is, can find,

Ev’n in an object mean as thee,

Food for the meditative mind:

But thus it is,—we close our hearts,

Our ears, our eyes, to things which, view’d

With the keen sense that truth imparts,

Might fill our souls with gratitude.

And this absurd and frigid pride,

By which our nature is disgrac’d,

Philosophy has dignified

With the proud name of manly taste.

It seems a proof of childishness

Thy song to love, thy praise to speak,

And he who should its power confess

Must be the weakest of the weak.

Well! be it so: —if life have taught

To me one truth distinctly clear,

’Tis this, that unto wakeful thought

The humblest source of joy is dear.

The lowliest object that can wake

Our better feelings by its power,

The minstrel for his theme may take,

In contemplation's musing hour.

Canst thou not waken such, sweet bird?

Yes; while I listen to thy lay,

Thought's hidden stream again seems stirr’d

By breezes, which were wont to play

Over its current's dimpled course,