ON FIRST HEARING A SKYLARK SING

Too late, thou tender songster of the sky

Trilling unseen, by things unseen inspired,

I list thy far-heard cry

That poets oft to kindred song hath fired,

As floating through the purple veils of air

Thy soul is poured on high,

A little joy in an immense despair.

Too late thou biddest me escape the earth,

In ignorance of wrong

To spin a little slender thread of song;

On yet unwearied wing

To rise and soar and sing,

Not knowing death or birth

Or any true unhappy human thing.

To dwell‘ twixt field and cloud,

By river-willow and the murmurous sedge,

Be thy sweet privilege,

To thee and to thy happy lords allowed.

My native valley higher mountains hedge

‘ Neath starlit skies and proud,

And sadder music in my soul is loud.

Yet have I loved thy voice,

Frail echo of some ancient sacred joy.

Ah, who might not rejoice

Here to have wandered, a fair English boy,

And breathed with life thy rapture and thy rest

Where woven meadow-grasses fold thy nest?

But whose life is his choice?

And he who chooseth not hath chosen best.