TO THE CUCKOO.

Alas! my journey, rugged and uneven,

Through prickly moors or dusty ways must wind;
But hearing thee, or others of thy kind,

As full of gladness and as free of heaven,
I, with my fate contented, will plod on,

And hope for higher raptures when life's day is done.

William Wordsworth.

TO THE CUCKOO.

HAIL, beauteous stranger of the grove!

Thou messenger of Spring!
Now heaven repairs thy rural seat,

And woods thy welcome sing.

Soon as the daisy decks the green,
Thy certain voice we hear.
Hast thou a star to guide thy path,
Or mark the rolling year?

Delightful visitant! with thee

I hail the time of flowers,
And hear the sound of music sweet
From birds among the bowers.

The school-boy, wandering through the wood

To pull the primrose gay,

Starts, thy most curious voice to hear,

And imitates thy lay.

What time the pea puts on the bloom,

Thon fliest thy vocal vale,

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An annual guest in other lands,
Another Spring to hail.

Sweet bird! thy bower is ever green,

Thy sky is ever clear;

Thou hast no sorrow in thy song,
No Winter in thy year!

Oh could I fly, I'd fly with thee!
We'd make, with joyful wing,
Our annual visit o'er the globe,
Attendants on the Spring.

John Logan

TO THE CUCKOO.

O BLITHE new-comer! I have heard,
I hear thee and rejoice.

O Cuckoo ! shall I call thee bird,
Or but a wandering voice?

While I am lying on the grass

Thy twofold shout I hear;
From hill to hill it seems to pass,
At once far off, and near.

Though babbling only to the vale,
Of sunshine and of flowers,

Thou bringest unto me a tale
Of visionary hours.

Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring!

E'en yet thou art to me

THE GREEN LINNET.

No bird, but an invisible thing,
A voice, a mystery;

The same that in my school-boy days
I listened to that cry

Which made me look a thousand ways,
In bush, and tree, and sky.

To seek thee did I often rove

Through woods and on the green ;
And thou wert still a hope, a love—
Still longed for, never seen.

And I can listen to thee yet;
Can lie upon the plain
And listen, till I do beget
That golden time again.

O blessed bird! the earth we pace,
Again appears to be

An unsubstantial, faery place,

That is fit home for thee!

William Wordsworth.

THE GREEN LINNET.

BENEATH these fruit-tree boughs, that shed
Their snow-white blossoms on my head,
With brightest sunshine round me spread,
Of Spring's unclouded weather-

In this sequestered nook, how sweet
To sit upon my orchard-seat!

And birds and flowers once more to greet,

My last year's friends together.

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One have I marked, the happiest guest

In all this covert of the blest:
Hail to thee, far above the rest
In joy of voice and pinion!
Thou, Linnet! in thy green array,
Presiding spirit here to-day,

Dost lead the revels of the May,

And this is thy dominion.

While birds, and butterflies, and flowers Make all one band of paramours,

Thou, ranging up and down the bowers,

Art sole in thy employment:

A life, a presence like the air,
Scattering thy gladness without care,
Too blest with any one to pair-
Thyself thy own enjoyment.

Amid yon tuft of hazel-trees,
That twinkle to the gusty breeze,
Behold him perched in ecstasies,

Yet seeming still to hover;
There! where the flutter of his wings
Upon his back and body flings
Shadows and sunny glimmerings,
That cover him all over.

My dazzled sight he oft deceives—
A brother of the dancing leaves-
Then flits, and from the cottage-eaves

Pours forth a song in gushes;

As if by that exulting strain

PIPING DOWN THE VALLEYS WILD.

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He mocked, and treated with disdain,
The voiceless form he chose to feign,
While fluttering in the bushes.

"Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe,

Sing thy songs of happy cheer."
So I sang the same again,

While he wept with joy to hear.

"Piper, sit thee down and write,
In a book, that all may read."
So he vanished from my sight,

And I plucked a hollow reed;

And I made a rural pen;

And I stained the water clear;
And I wrote my happy songs
Every child may joy to hear.

William Blake.