All April's larks in her most lavish sky Know less of song than these! O mournful two, Birds of Cremona, what shall rouse in you The keen, edged sound once scattered planet high? Like carrier doves, dismissed, unwinged, you lie In dusty fame, your loosened strings untrue To any key, hang limp as grasses do After the long, long drought when meadows die. This is no mood for lordly violins! These mellow masters in their disarray Behind museum doors! These gipsy kings! I'd set them singing, tucked beneath the chins Of fiddler-folk whose fingers know the way: Prancing like peacocks up the four gay strings! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A COURT LADY by ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING AULD LANG SYNE by ROBERT BURNS LITTLE BROWN BABY by PAUL LAURENCE DUNBAR CRADLE SONG (TO A TUNE OF BLAKE'S): 1 by ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE A WOMAN'S APOLOGY by ALFRED AUSTIN PSALM 102 by OLD TESTAMENT BIBLE IDYLL 2. EROS AND THE FOWLER by BION |