- Sweetly chanting carols wild,
- Easy strains and quavers mild,
- Clearly warbling from her throat,
- Robin pour'd the tuneful note,
- Perch'd upon a flexible spray,
- Singing her short life away.
- Fine the morn and fresh the air,
- Sol arose resplendent, fair;
- Cloudless was the azure sky,
- Mantled in its bluest die;
- Sportive scenes aerial,
- Rul'd the eye imperial,
- Floating on the balmy gale,
- Hov'ring o'er the flow'ry vale.
- Robin hail'd the cheering day,
- Blushing with the charm of May;
- Shone the sun-beam on her breast,
- Which her rosy plumage drest;
- Seem'd delighted with the view
- And delightful was she too;
- Careless of the rushing breeze,
- Blowing 'mong the rustling trees,
- Waving to and fro the spray,
- Whence arose the honied lay
- Robin fat contented, free,
- Full of life and merry glee.
- On a flow'r-bed where the dew
- Spangled on the vi'let blue;
- By a bank reclined I,
- Where a riv'let girgled by,
- Heard the mild and quiv'ring trill,
- With the murm'rings of the rill;
- With the little minstrel charm'd,
- While the muse by bosom warm'd,
- I beheld her transient bliss,
- Sueing for her happiness,
- Free from discontent and care
- Never shedding sorrow's tear;
- She no mis'ry ever knows,
- Virtue in her bosom glows;
- Her's a life free from pain,
- Naught to loose, nor naught to gain.
- Man has something to be gain'd,
- Which by Virtue is obtain'd.
- Then, thou Red-breast, trust a maid,
- In thee I can confide;
- In a life which sins degrade,
- Be thou a moral guide.
- Since my life depends on chance
- The past I can't retrieve
- By thy native innocence,
- O teach me how to live.
History and Legacy of Wild Birds Including Historic Ornithology and Other Topics of Interest
06 November 2013
An 1806 Sonnet
Labels:
poetry