To the Nightingale
by William Drummond

Scottish poet. The main collections of his verse are Poems, Amorous, Funereal, Divine, Pastoral, in Sonnets, Songs, Sextains, Madrigals (1616), The Muses Welcome (1618), and Flowers of Sion (1623), which includes the religious sonnets 'For the Magdalene' and 'Saint John Baptist'. He spent many years writing a History of Scotland 1423-1524, and another notable prose work is A Cypress Grove (1623), a meditation on death. His notes on Ben Jonson's conversation were published in 1832.

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To the Nightingale
by William Drummond

Sweet bird, that sing'st away the early hours
Of winters past or coming, void of care,
Well pleased with delights which present are,
(Fair seasons, budding sprays, sweet-smelling flowers)
To rocks, to springs, to rills, from leafy bowers
Thou thy Creator's goodness dost declare,
And what dear gifts on thee He did not spare:
A stain to human sense in sin that lours,
What soul can be so sick which by thy songs
(Attired in sweetness) sweetly is not driven
Quite to forget earth's turmoils, spites, and wrongs,
And lift a reverend eye and thought to heaven?
Sweet artless songster, thou my mind dost raise
To airs of spheres, yes, and to angels' lays.

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To the Nightingale by William Drummond