'Sweetness to My Sense'

R.S. Gwynn takes a story related by Izaak Walton in The Life of Mr. George Herbert (1670) and turns it into a poetic fable of humility and service. Here is “Music at Midnight,” published in the Summer 2016 issue of The Sewanee Review and dedicated “After Walton, for W. Brown Patterson”: “Mr. Herbert entered, so befouled with mud and shit His Tuesday consort, ready with their silent lutes, Were all aghast, save one who asked, with a wag’s wit, ‘Crawled you here from Old Sarum’s pits or on worser routes?’ He said, ‘I came upon a poor man and his horse. The wretched beast had fallen underneath its load; I engaged to right him and set both upon the road, And the hour going, in this fair state resumed my course. “‘I tell you this as fact. In all humility I take no credit for the deed yet must confess Had I not stopped today for them I could not bless, In faith, the wafer and the wine. Thus this shall be For me, music at midnight, sweetness to my sense. Now, gentlemen, time flies. Let's…