To the Nightengale

  1. 1Sister of love-lorn Poets, Philomel!
  2. 2How many Bards in city garret pent,
  3. 3While at their window they with downward eye
  4. 4Mark the faint lamp-beam on the kennell'd mud,
  5. 5And listen to the drowsy cry of Watchmen
  6. 6(Those hoarse unfeather'd Nightingales of Time!),
  7. 7How many wretched Bards address thy name,
  8. 8And hers, the full-orb'd Queen that shines above.
  9. 9But I do hear thee, and the high bough mark,
  10. 10Within whose mild moon-mellow'd foliage hid
  11. 11Thou warblest sad thy pity-pleading strains.
  12. 12O! I have listened, till my working soul,
  13. 13Waked by those strains to thousand phantasies,
  14. 14Absorb'd hath ceas'd to listen! Therefore oft,
  15. 15I hymn thy name: and with a proud delight
  16. 16Oft will I tell thee, Minstrel of the Moon!
  17. 17'Most musical, most melancholy' Bird!
  18. 18That all thy soft diversities of tone,
  19. 19Tho' sweeter far than the delicious airs
  20. 20That vibrate from a white-arm'd Lady's harp,
  21. 21What time the languishment of lonely love
  22. 22Melts in her eye, and heaves her breast of snow,
  23. 23Are not so sweet as is the voice of her,
  24. 24My Sara--best beloved of human kind!
  25. 25When breathing the pure soul of tenderness,
  26. 26She thrills me with the Husband's promis'd name!