The Poet's Song

First published in 1842.

  The rain had fallen, the Poet arose,
  He pass'd by the town and out of the street,
  A light wind blew from the gates of the sun,
  And waves of shadow went over the wheat,
  And he sat him down in a lonely place,
  And chanted a melody loud and sweet,
  That made the wild-swan pause in her cloud,
  And the lark drop down at his feet.
  The swallow stopt as he hunted the bee, [1]
  The snake slipt under a spray,
  The wild hawk stood with the down on his beak,
  And stared, with his foot on the prey,
  And the nightingale thought, "I have sung many songs,
  But never a one so gay,
  For he sings of what the world will be
  When the years have died away".

[Footnote 1: 1889, Fly.]