Hah, when I thought about the Lonely Bard I understood that he is quite a figure. Not only he listened to muse, he became one himself.
It leads to the question: is the bard really lonely while he found ones who listened to his story?
I found possible answer: the bard is not alone anymore but the Death allows him only to haunt others with music. Or rather his music, like Orpheus' one, bought the Death to provide music to one who is worthy.
Of course, if the bard is dead and death has power over him, the second possibility appears. The memory can also haunt, but for how long memory is quite clear to recognise melody? Even days can blur some sounds that creates the music. Another 'power' of the Lonely Bard could be writing melodies into hearts, then. Putting them that far, that they exist like artificial thoughts appearing in night time as the inspiration.
Generally, beautiful. As you can see, I tried to interprete that :). If you could say why the Lonely Bard became or was lonely; if you could say whether world refused him like Cassandra (from Greek Mythology) or was there another story...