Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, TO THE WOOD-ROBIN, by JOHN BANISTER TABB


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

TO THE WOOD-ROBIN, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: The wooing air is jubilant with song
Last Line: To rise from earthly dreams to hymn eternity.
Alternate Author Name(s): Father Tabb
Subject(s): Robins


The wooing air is jubilant with song,
And blossoms swell
As leaps thy liquid melody along
The dusky dell,
Where silence, late supreme, foregoes her wonted spell.

Ah, whence, in sylvan solitudes remote,
Hast learned the lore
That breeds delight in every echoing note,
The woodlands o'er;
As when through slanting sun descends the quickening shower?

Thy hermitage is peopled with the dreams
That gladden sleep;
Here fancy dallies with delirious themes
'Mid shadows deep,
Till eyes, unused to tears, with wild emotion weep.

We rise, alas, to find out visions fled!
But thine remain.
Night weaves of golden harmonies the thread,
And fills thy brain
With joys that overflow in love's awakening strain.

Yet thou, from mortal influence apart,
Seek'st naught of praise;
The empty plaudits of the emptier heart
Taint not thy lays:
Thy Maker's smile alone thy tuneful bosom sways.

Teach me, thou warbling eremite, to sing
Thy rhapsody;
Nor borne on vain ambition's vaunting wing,
But led of thee
To rise from earthly dreams to hymn eternity.





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