Spring flies, and with it all the train it leads
And flowers, in fading, leave us but their seeds.
I sing the first green leaf upon the bough,
The tiny kindling flame of emerald fire,
The stir amid the roots of reeds, and how
The sap will flush the briar.
For, lo! the winter is past, the rain is over and
gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time
of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land.
So forth issew'd the Seasons of the yeare:
First, lusty Spring, all dight in leaves of flowres
That freshly budded and new bloomes did beare,
In which a thousand birds had built their bowres
That sweetly sung to call forth paramours;
And in his hand a javelin he did beare,
And on his head (as fit for warlike stoures)
A guilt, engraven morion he did weare:
That, as some did him love, so others did him
feare.
Now the hedged meads renew
Rustic odor, smiling hue,
And the clean air shines and twinkles as the
world goes wheeling through;
And my heart springs up anew,
Bright and confident and true,
And my old love comes to meet me in the dawning and the dew.
It is the season now to go
About the country high and low,
Among the lilacs hand in hand,
And two by two in fairyland.
O tender time that love thinks long to see,
Sweet foot of Spring that with her footfall sows
Late snow-like flowery leavings of the snows,
Be not too long irresolute to be;
O mother-month, where have they hidden thee?
Once more the Heavenly Power
Makes all things new,
And domes the red-plough'd hills
With loving blue;
The blackbirds have their wills,
The throstles too.
The bee buzz'd up in the heat,
"I am faint for your honey, my sweet."
The flower said, "Take it, my dear,
For now is the Spring of the year.
So come, comet"
"Hum!"
And the bee buzz'd down from the heat.
Dip down upon the northern shore,
O sweet Dew year, delaying long;
Thou doest expectant nature wrong,
Delaying long; delay no more.
In the Spring a livelier iris changes on the burnish'd dove;
In the Spring a young man's fancy lightly turns
to thoughts of love.
The boyhood of the year.
Come, gentle Spring; ethereal Mildness, come!
The Clouds consign their treasures to the fields,
And, softly shaking on the dimpled pool,
Prelusive drops, let all their moisture flow
In large effusion, o'er the freshen'd world.
Fair-handed Spring unbosoms every grace:
Throws out the snowdrop and the crocus first.
'Tis spring-time on the eastern hills!
Like torrents gush the summer rills;
Through winter's moss and dry dead leaves
The bladed grass revives and lives,
Pushes the mouldering waste away,
And glimpses to the April day.
And all the woods are alive with the murmur and sound of spring,
And the rosebud breaks into pink on the climbing briar,
And the crocus bed is a quivering moon of fire
Girdled round with the belt of an amethyst ring.
The Spring is here—the delicate footed May,
With its slight fingers full of leaves and flowers,
And with it comes a thirst to be away,
In lovelier scenes to pass these sweeter hours.
STAGE, The (See Acting)
STARS
The spacious firmament on high,
With all the blue ethereal sky,
And spangled heavens, a shining frame,
Their great Original proclaim.
Forever singing, as they shine*.
The hand that made us is divine.
Surely the stars are images of love.
