Bird, The. 
By Finch, Anne (Countess of Winchilsea). 


Kind bird, thy praises I design:
Thy praises like thy plumes should shine,
Thy praises should thy life outlive
Could I the fame I wish thee give.
Thou my domestic music art,
And dearest trifle of my heart.
Soft in thy notes, and in thy dress
Softer than numbers can express;
Softer than love, softer than light
When just escaping from the night,
When first she rises, unarrayed,
And steals a passage through the shade;
Softer than air, or flying clouds
Which Phoebus' glory thinly shrouds;
Gay as the spring, gay as the flowers
When lightly strewed with pearly showers.
Ne'er to the woods shalt thou return,
Nor thy wild freedom shalt thou mourn;
Thou to my bosom shall repair,
And find a safer shelter there:
There shalt thou watch, and, should I sleep,
My heart thy charge securely keep.
Love, who a stranger is to me,
Must by thy wings be kin to thee;
So painted o'er, so seeming fair,
So soft his first addresses are.
Thy guard he ne'er can pass unseen;
Then surely thou hast often been,
Whilst yet a wanderer in the grove,
A false accomplice with this love;
In the same shade hast thou not sate
And seen him work some wretch's fate?
Hast thou not soothed him in the wrong,
And graced the mischief with a song,
Tuning thy loud conspiring voice
O'er falling lovers to rejoice?
If so, thy wicked faults redeem;
In league with me, no truce with him
Do thou admit, but warn my heart,
And all his sly designs impart,
Lest to that breast by craft he get
Which has defied and braved him yet.