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Clare, John - Sing on sweet bird; may no worse hap befall
Identifier
005185
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
A description of the experience
John Clare– from the Everyman's poetry collection
Sing on sweet bird; may no worse hap befall Thy visions than the fear that now deceives. We will not plunder music of its dower Nor turn this spot of happiness to thrall For melody seems hid in every flower That blossoms near thy home – these harebells all Seem bowing with the beautiful in song, And gaping cuckoo with its spotted leaves Seems blushing of the singing it has heard
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How curious is the nest. No other bird Uses such loose materials or weaves Their dwellings in such spots – dead oaken leaves Are placed without and velvet moss within And little scraps of grass – and scant and spare Of what seem scarce materials, down and hair For from man's haunts she seemeth nought to win
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This is the month the Nightingale, clod brown, Is heard among the woodland shady boughs This is the time when in the vale, grass grown, The maiden hears at eve her lover's vows What time the blue mist round her patient cows Dim rises from the grass and half conceals Their dappled hides – I hear the Nightingale, That from the little blackthorn spinny steals To the old hazel hedge that skirts the vale, And still unseen, sings sweet – the ploughman feels The thrilling music as he goes along And imitates and listens – while the fields Lose all their paths in dusk to lead him wrong Still sings the Nightingale her sweet melodious song
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And where these crimping fern leaves ramp among The hazel's underboughs – I've nestled down And watched her while she sung – and her renown Hath made me marvel that so famed a bird Should have no better dress than russet brown. Her wings would tremble in her ecstasy And feathers stand on end as 'twere with joy And mouth wide open to release her heart Of its out sobbing songs – the happiest part Of Summer's fame she shared – for so to me Did happy fancies shapen her employ But if I touched a bush or scarcely stirred All in a moment stopped – I watched in vain The timid bird had left the hazel bush And at a distance hid to sing again, Lost in a wilderness of listening leaves. Rich ecstasy would pour its luscious strain Till envy spurred the emulating thrush To start less wild and scarce inferior songs, For cares with him for half the year remain To damp the ardour of his speckled breast, While nightingales to Summer's life belongs, And naked trees and Winter's nipping wrongs Are strangers to her music and her rest
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