Poet And The Bird, The
Said a people to a poet---" Go out from among us straightway!
While we are thinkihly things, thou si of divine.
Theres a little fair brown nightingale, who, sitting ieways
Makes fitter music to our ears than any song of thine!"
The poet went out weeping---the nightingale ceased ting;
"Now, wherefore, O thou nightingale, is all thy sweetness done?"
I ot sing my earthly things, the heavenly poet wanting,
Whose highest harmony includes the lowest under sun."
The poet went out weeping,---and died abroad, bereft there---
The bird flew to his grave and died, amid a thousand wails:---
And, when I last came by the place, I swear the music left there
Was only of the poets song, and not the nightingales.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning