O Rural Life! what charms thy meanness hide;
What sweet descriptions bards disdain to sing;
What loves, what graces on thy plains abide:
Oh, could I soar me on the Muse’s wing,
What rifled charms should my researches bring!
Pleas’d would I wander where these charms reside;
Of rural sports and beauties would I sing;
Those beauties, Wealth, which you in vain deride,
Beauties of richest bloom, superior to your pride.
ON AN INFANT’S GRAVE
BENEATH the sod where smiling creep
The daisies into view,
The ashes of an Infant sleep,
Whose soul’s as smiling too;
Ah! doubly happy, doubly blest,
(Had I so happy been!)
Recall’d to heaven’s eternal rest,
Ere it knew how to sin.
Thrice happy Infant! great the bliss
Alone reserv’d for thee;
Such joy ’twas my sad fate to miss,
And thy good luck to see;
For oh! when all must rise again,
And sentence then shall have,
What crowds will wish with me, in vain,
They’d fill’d an infant’s grave.
TO AN APRIL DAISY
WELCOME, old Comrade! peeping once again;
Our meeting ’minds me of a pleasant hour:
Spring’s pencil pinks thee in that blushy stain,
And Summer glistens in thy tinty flower.
Hail, Beauty’s Gem! disdaining time nor place;
Carelessly creeping on the dunghill’s side;
Demeanour’s softness in thy crimpled face
Decks thee in beauties unattain’d by pride.
Hail, ’Venturer! once again that fearless here
Encampeth on the hoar hill’s sunny side;
Spring’s early messenger! thou’rt doubly dear;
And winter’s frost by thee is well supplied.