And I have travelled far as Hull to see

What clothes he might have left, or other property.

"The bird and cage they both were his :

'Twas my son's bird; and neat and trim

He kept it: many voyages

His singing-bird had gone with him;

When last he sailed, he left the bird behind;
As it might be, perhaps, from bodings of his mind.

"He to a fellow-lodger's care

Had left it, to be watched and fed,
Till he came back again; and there

I found it when my son was dead;

And now, God help me for my little wit!

I trail it with me, Sir! he took so much delight in it."

From hill to hill it seems to pass
At once far off and near.

I hear thee babbling to the vale,
Of sunshine and of flowers,
And unto me thou bringest a tale
Of visionary hours.

Thrice welcome, darling of the spring!

Even yet thou art to me

No bird but an invisible thing,

A voice, a mystery.

The same whom in my school-boy days I listened to; that cry

Which made me look a thousand ways In bush, and tree, and sky.

To seek thee did I often rove

Through woods and on the green; And thou wert still a hope, a love; Still longed for, never seen.

And I can listen to thee yet;
Can lie upon the plain
And listen, till I do beget
That golden time again.

O blessed bird! the earth we pace
Again appears to be

An unsubstantial, fairy place,

That is fit home for thee!