What lark remembers when he sings,
From where the clouds are dim and grey,
His brothers of the former springs,
Who sang their songs and passed away?
They shrank unseen within the night,
Like hearts that sicken at a wrong,
Or mounting in the open light
Fell from their world of happy song.
Some feathers, left for winds to blow
Among the hills where shepherds tread,
Is all that Nature keeps to show
A little bunch of song is dead.
For she is lavish: all the year
Her splendid service daily sings;
And perfect to her perfect ear
Her immemorial music rings.
If one should fail from out the band,
He sinks unknown and dies unwept;
And she—she only waves her wand,
And still the perfect chord is kept.
But we who stand with feet on earth,
The lesser poets of our time,
Whose songs have most imperfect birth,
And jarring music in their rhyme,
We sing; and discords only rise,
Because our hearts are out of tune,
And cannot touch the harmonies
That round a summer day in June.
Our songs are but of doubts and fears
That haunt us with their shadowy wing;
The rainbows that we see through tears
Fade into sadness as we sing.
The sorrows of the singing race
Are with us turn we as we may;
We touch the strings, and only trace
The plaint of others passed away.
The riper spirits sing their songs;
They watch the ever-changing show,
Like Nature, who can see no wrongs,
But lets her seasons come and go.
The weaklings we—our piping bears
Half-light, half-shadow, and the gleam
So mingles with our little cares,
And colours all our daily dream.
Not so the lark. To-day he sings,
Unmindful of—though others may—
His brethren of the former springs
Who sang their songs and passed away.