O NIGHTINGALE and cuckoo! it was meet That you should come together; for ye twain Are emblems of the rapture and the pain That in the April of our life compete, Until we know not which is the more sweet, Nor yet have learned that both of them are vain! Yet why, O nightingale! break off thy strain, While yet the cuckoo doth his call repeat? Not so with me. To sweet woe die I cling Long after echoing happiness was dead, And so found solace. Now, alas! the sting! Cuckoo and nightingale alike have fled; Neither for joy nor sorrow do I sing, And autumn silence gathers in their stead. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...VARIATIONS: 18 by CONRAD AIKEN FAIRY TALE by KATHERINE MANSFIELD NOCTURNE IN A MINOR KEY by CONRAD AIKEN PORTRAIT OF A BABY by STEPHEN VINCENT BENET SPOKEN AT A CASTLE GATE by DONALD (GRADY) DAVIDSON |