Go on, Sweet Bird, and Sooth my Care
The speaker addresses a sweet bird whose song may soothe his sorrow. Nature laughs, shines, and pours out the freshness of spring for the bird, but her beauty is meaningless to the speaker because joy remains absent from his heart.
By Robert Burns · First published 1803 · Genre: Lyric Poetry, Love Poetry, Melancholic Poetry · 41 words
First lines
For thee is laughing Nature gay, / For thee she pours the vernal day; / For me in vain is Nature drest, / While Joy's a stranger to my breast.
Similar titles
- My Heart When First The Blackbird Sings by Robert Louis Stevenson
- Song Composed In Spring by Robert Burns
- On A May Morning So Early by Sabine Baring Gould
- The Winter It Is Past by Robert Burns
- Talk Of Him Thats Far Awa by Robert Burns
- Foxgloves by Helen Gray Cone
Genres
- Lyric Poetry — The work is a short, intensely personal poetic expression of the speaker's emotional state rather than a narrative or dramatic composition.
- Love Poetry — Its address to a beloved figure and contrast between that figure's happiness and the speaker's sorrow suggest longing connected to love or separation.
- Melancholic Poetry — The central theme is emotional desolation: despite spring's beauty, joy remains absent from the speaker's heart.
- Nature Poetry — The verse uses laughing Nature, the vernal day, and the dressing of the natural world as prominent imagery and as a contrast to private grief.
Tags
lyric poetry · nature poetry · spring · vernal day · birds · birdsong · sorrow · melancholy · loneliness · joylessness · emotional isolation · unrequited happiness
What this Textopian page supports
Go on, Sweet Bird, and Sooth my Care is listed on Textopian as a poem by Robert Burns, dated 1803 CE.
This source record anchors work identity, reading entry points, and catalog context for checking claims about the work.
- Work type: Poem
- Author: Robert Burns
- Date: 1803 CE
- Language: English
- Genres: Lyric Poetry, Love Poetry, Melancholic Poetry, Nature Poetry, Pastoral Poetry
- Length: 41 words
- Structure: 1 section, 1 paragraphs
Good citation fit
- Work identity for Go on, Sweet Bird, and Sooth my Care by Robert Burns
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