A Sonnet to Clare by Thomas Crossley

[Image: Annie Lee] 

A Sonnet to Clare

Bard of the Pastoral reed!  if aught of song,

   Or poesy, a stranger should inspire,

(Whose ear, old Ebor’s heathery hill among,

   Has heard the magic of they soothing lyre;)

To thee should swell the chords of harmony,

   And to the world those feelings should impart,

Which in his bosom struggle to be free,

   And thro’ his sould their quick vibrations dart, --

Oft has he conn’d, with ever-glowing heart,

   Thy rural themes beneath thw woodland tree,

Till fast the sympathetic tears would start

   From Rapture’s fountain.  Hence, sweet bard, would he

For thee, (O poor return for gifts like thine!)

   Amid thy bays this simple flower entwine.

Thomas Crossley

19 December 1831