To the Memory of Bloomfield

Sweet unassuming Minstrel! not to thee
The dazzling fashions of the day belong;
Nature's wild pictures, field, and cloud, and tree,
And quiet brooks, far distant from the throng,
In murmurs tender as the toiling bee,
Make the sweet music of thy gentle song.
Well! Nature owns thee: let the crowd pass by;
The tide of fashion is a stream too strong
For pastoral brooks, that gently flow and sing:
But Nature is their source, and earth and sky
Their annual offering to her current bring.
Thy gentle muse and memory need no sigh;
For thine shall murmur on to many a spring,
When prouder streams are summer-burnt and dry.