To the Nightingale (Finch)

Exert thy voice, sweet harbinger of spring! This moment is thy time to sing, This moment I attend to praise, And set my numbers to they lays. Free as thine shall be my song; As they music, short, or long. Poets, wild as thee, were born, Pleasing best when unconfined, When to please is least designed, Soothing but their cares to rest; Cares do still their thoughts molest, And still th' unhappy poet's breast, Like thine, when best he sings, is placed against a thorn. She begins, Let all be still! Muse, they promise now fulfill! Sweet, oh! sweet, still sweeter yet Can thy words such accents fit, Canst thou syllables refine, Melt a sense that shall retain Still some spirit of the brain, Till with sounds like these it join. 'Twill not be! then change thy note; Let division shake thy throat. Hark! Division now she tries; Yet as far the Muse outflies. Cease then, prithee, cease thy tune; Trifler, wilt thou sing till *June*? Till thy business all lies waste, And the time of building's past! Thus we poets that have speech, Unlike what they forests teach, If a fluent vein be shown, That's transcendant to our own, Criticize, reform, or preach, Or censure what we cannot reach.