To Mr Edwards, the Harper of Conway

Minstrel! whose gifted hand can bring
Life, rapture, soul, from every string;
And wake, like bards of former time,
The spirit of the harp sublime;--
Oh! still prolong the varying strain!
Oh! touch th’ enchanted chords again!

Thine is the charm, suspending care,
The heavenly swell, the dying close,
The cadence melting into air,
That lulls each passion to repose;
While transport, lost in silence near,
Breathes all her language in a tear.

Exult, O Cambria!--now no more
With sighs thy slaughter’d bards deplore:
What though Plinlimmon’s misty brow
And Mona’s woods be silent now,
Yet can thy Conway boast a strain
Unrivall’d in thy proudest reign.

For Genius, with divine control,
Wakes the bold chord neglected long,
And pours Expression’s glowing soul
O’er the wild Harp, renown’d in song;
And Inspiration, hovering round,
Swells the full energies of sound.

Now Grandeur, pealing in the tone,
Could rouse the warrior’s kindling fire,
And now, ’tis like the breeze’s moan,
That murmurs o’er th’ Eolian lyre:
As if some sylph, with viewless wing,
Were sighing o’er the magic string.

Long, long, fair Conway! boast the skill
That soothes, inspires, commands, at will!
And oh! while rapture hails the lay,
Far distant be the closing day,
When Genius, Taste, again shall weep,
And Cambria’s Harp lie hush’d in sleep!