We shall not feel if the sun rise,
    We shall not care when it sets:
If a nightingale make night’s air
As noontide, why should we care?
Till a light of delight that is done rise,
    Extinguishing grey regrets;

Till a child’s face lighten again
    On the twilight of older faces;
Till a child’s voice fall as the dew
On furrows with heat parched through
And all but hopeless of grain,
    Refreshing the desolate places—

Fall clear on the ears of us hearkening
    And hungering for food of the sound
And thirsting for joy of his voice:
Till the hearts in us hear and rejoice,
And the thoughts of them doubting and darkening
    Rejoice with a glad thing found.

When the heart of our gladness is gone,
    What comfort is left with us after?
When the light of our eyes is away,
What glory remains upon May,
What blessing of song is thereon
    If we drink not the light of his laughter?

No small sweet face with the daytime
    To welcome, warmer than noon!
No sweet small voice as a bird’s
To bring us the day’s first words!
Mid May for us here is not Maytime!
    No summer begins with June.

A whole dead month in the dark,
    A dawn in the mists that o’ercome her
Stifled and smothered and sad—
Swift speed to it, barren and bad!
And return to us, voice of the lark,
    And remain with us, sunlight of summer.

ALAS, what right has the dawn to glimmer,
    What right has the wind to do aught but moan?
All the day should be dimmer
    Because we are left alone.

Yestermorn like a sunbeam present
    Hither and thither a light step smiled,
And made each place for us pleasant
    With the sense or the sight of a child.

But the leaves persist as before, and after
    Our parting the dull day still bears flowers
And songs less bright than his laughter
    Deride us from birds in the bowers.

Birds, and blossoms, and sunlight only,
    As though such folly sufficed for spring!
As though the house were not lonely
    For want of the child its king!

ASLEEP and afar to-night my darling
    Lies, and heeds not the night,
If winds be stirring or storms be snarling;
    For his sleep is its own sweet light.

I sit where he sat beside me quaffing
    The wine of story and song
Poured forth of immortal cups, and laughing
    When mirth in the draught grew strong.

I broke the gold of the words, to melt it
    For hands but seven years old,
And they caught the tale as a bird, and felt it
    More bright than visible gold.

And he drank down deep, with his eyes broad beaming,
    Here in this room where I am,
The golden vintage of Shakespeare, gleaming
    In the silver vessels of Lamb.

Here by my hearth where he was I listen
    For the shade of the sound of a word,
Athirst for the birdlike eyes to glisten,
    For the tongue to chirp like a bird.

At the blast of battle, how broad they brightened,
    Like fire in the spheres of stars,
And clung to the pictured page, and lightened
    As keen as the heart of Mars!

At the touch of laughter, how swift it twittered
    The shrillest music on earth;
How the lithe limbs laughed and the whole child glittered
    With radiant riot of mirth!

Our Shakespeare now, as a man dumb-stricken,
    Stands silent there on the shelf:
And my thoughts, that had song in the heart of them, sicken,
    And relish not Shakespeare’s self.

And my mood grows moodier than Hamlet’s even,
    And man delights not me,
But only the face that morn and even
    My heart leapt only to see.

That my heart made merry within me seeing,
    And sang as his laugh kept time:
But song finds now no pleasure in being,
    And love no reason in rhyme.

MILD May-blossom and proud sweet bay-flower,
    What, for shame, would you have with us here?
It is not the month of the May-flower
    This, but the fall of the year.

Flowers open only their lips in derision,
    Leaves are as fingers that point in scorn:
The shows we see are a vision;
    Spring is not verily born.

Yet boughs turn supple and buds grow sappy,
    As though the sun were indeed the sun:
And all our woods are happy
    With all their birds save one.

But spring is over, but summer is over,
    But autumn is over, and winter stands
With his feet sunk deep in the clover
    And cowslips cold in his hands.

His hoar grim head has a hawthorn bonnet,
    His gnarled gaunt hand has a gay green staff
With new-blown rose-blossom on it:
    But his laugh is a dead man’s laugh.

The laugh of spring that the heart seeks after,
    The hand that the whole world yearns to kiss,
It rings not here in his laughter,
    The sign of it is not this.

There is not strength in it left to splinter
    Tall oaks, nor frost in his breath to sting:
Yet it is but a breath as of winter,
    And it is not the hand of spring.

THIRTY-ONE pale maidens, clad
    All in mourning dresses,
Pass, with lips and eyes more sad
That it seems they should be glad,
Heads discrowned of crowns they had,
    Grey for golden tresses.

Grey their girdles too for green,
    And their veils dishevelled:
None would say, to see their mien,
That the least of these had been
Born no baser than a queen,
    Reared where flower-fays revelled.

Dreams that strive to seem awake,
    Ghosts that walk by daytime,
Weary winds the way they take,
Since, for one child’s absent sake,
May knows well, whate’er things make
    Sport, it is not Maytime.

A HAND at the door taps light
As the hand of my heart’s delight:
    It is but a full-grown hand,
Yet the stroke of it seems to start
Hope like a bird in my heart,
    Too feeble to soar or to stand.

To start light hope from her cover
Is to raise but a kite for a plover
    If her wings be not fledged to soar.
Desire, but in dreams, cannot ope
The door that was shut upon hope
    When love went out at the door.

Well were it if vision could keep
The lids of desire as in sleep
    Fast locked, and over his eyes
A dream with the dark soft key
In her hand might hover, and be
    Their keeper till morning rise;

The morning that brings after many
Days fled with no light upon any
    The small face back which is gone;
When the loved little hands once more
Shall struggle and strain at the door
    They beat their summons upon.

IF a soul for but seven days were cast out of heaven and its mirth,
They would seem to her fears like as seventy years upon earth.

Even and morrow should seem to her sorrow as long
As the passage of numberless ages in slumberless song.

Dawn, roused by the lark, would be surely as dark in her sight
As her measureless measure of shadowless pleasure was bright.

Noon, gilt but with glory of gold, would be hoary and grey
In her eyes that had gazed on the depths, unamazed with the day.

Night hardly would seem to make darker her dream never done,
When it could but withhold what a man may behold of the sun.

For dreams would perplex, were the days that should vex her but seven,
The sight of her vision, made dark with division from heaven.

Till the light on my lonely way lighten that only now gleams,
I too am divided from heaven and derided of dreams.

A TWILIGHT fire-fly may suggest
    How flames the fire that feeds the sun:
‘A crooked figure may attest
    In little space a million.’

But this faint-figured verse, that dresses
    With flowers the bones of one bare month,
Of all it would say scarce expresses
    In crooked ways a millionth.

A fire-fly tenders to the father
    Of fires a tribute something worth:
My verse, a shard-borne beetle rather,
    Drones over scarce-illumined earth.

Some inches round me though it brighten
    With light of music-making thought,
The dark indeed it may not lighten,
    The silence moves not, hearing nought.

Only my heart is eased with hearing,
    Only mine eyes are soothed with seeing,
A face brought nigh, a footfall nearing,
    Till hopes take form and dreams have being.

AS a poor man hungering stands with insatiate eyes and hands
                        Void of bread
Right in sight of men that feast while his famine with no least
                        Crumb is fed,

Here across the garden-wall can I hear strange children call,
                        Watch them play,
From the windowed seat above, whence the goodlier child I love
                        Is away.

Here the sights we saw together moved his fancy like a feather
                        To and fro,
Now to wonder, and thereafter to the sunny storm of laughter
                        Loud and low—

Sights engraven on storied pages where man’s tale of seven swift ages
                        All was told—
Seen of eyes yet bright from heaven for the lips that laughed were seven
                        Sweet years old.

WHY should May remember
    March, if March forget
The days that began with December,
    The nights that a frost could fret?

All their griefs are done with
    Now the bright months bless
Fit souls to rejoice in the sun with,
    Fit heads for the wind’s caress;

Souls of children quickening
    With the whole world’s mirth,
Heads closelier than field-flowers thickening
    That crowd and illuminate earth,

Now that May’s call musters
    Files of baby bands
To marshal in joyfuller clusters
    Than the flowers that encumber their hands.

Yet morose November
    Found them no less gay,
With nought to forget or remember
    Less bright than a branch of may.

All the seasons moving
    Move their minds alike
Applauding, acclaiming, approving
    All hours of the year that strike.

So my heart may fret not,
    Wondering if my friend
Remember me not or forget not
    Or ever the month find end.

Not that love sows lighter
    Seed in children sown,
But that life being lit in them brighter
    Moves fleeter than even our own.

May nor yet September
    Binds their hearts, that yet
Remember, forget, and remember,
    Forget, and recall, and forget

As light on a lake’s face moving
    Between a cloud and a cloud
Till night reclaim it, reproving
    The heart that exults too loud,

The heart that watching rejoices
    When soft it swims into sight
Applauded of all the voices
    And stars of the windy night,

So brief and unsure, but sweeter
    Than ever a moondawn smiled,
Moves, measured of no tune’s metre,
    The song in the soul of a child;

The song that the sweet soul singing
    Half listens, and hardly hears,
Though sweeter than joy-bells ringing
    And brighter than joy’s own tears;

The song that remembrance of pleasure
    Begins, and forgetfulness ends
With a soft swift change in the measure
    That rings in remembrance of friends

As the moon on the lake’s face flashes,
    So haply may gleam at whiles
A dream through the dear deep lashes
    Whereunder a child’s eye smiles,

And the least of us all that love him
    May take for a moment part
With angels around and above him,
    And I find place in his heart

CHILD, were you kinless and lonely—
    Dear, were you kin to me—
My love were compassionate only
    Or such as it needs would be.

But eyes of father and mother
    Like sunlight shed on you shine:
What need you have heed of another
    Such new strange love as is mine?

It is not meet if unruly
    Hands take of the children’s bread
And cast it to dogs; but truly
    The dogs after all would be fed.

On crumbs from the children’s table
    That crumble, dropped from above,
Mr heart feeds, fed with unstable
    Loose waifs of a child’s light love.

Though love in your heart were brittle
    As glass that breaks with a touch,
You haply would lend him a little
    Who surely would give you much.

HERE is a rough
    Rude sketch of my friend,
Faint-coloured enough
    And unworthily penned.

Fearlessly fair
    And triumphant he stands,
And holds unaware
    Friends’ hearts in his hands;

Stalwart and straight
    As an oak that should bring
Forth gallant and great
    Fresh roses in spring.

On the paths of his pleasure
    All graces that wait
What metre shall measure
    What rhyme shall relate

Each action, each motion,
    Each feature, each limb,
Demands a devotion
    In honour of him:

Head that the hand
    Of a god might have blest,
Laid lustrous and bland
    On the curve of its crest:

Mouth sweeter than cherries
    Keen eyes as of Mars
Browner than berries
    And brighter than stars.

Nor colour nor wordy
    Weak song can declare
The stature how sturdy,
    How stalwart his air.

As a king in his bright
    Presence-chamber may be,
So seems he in height—
    Twice higher than your knee.

As a warrior sedate
    With reserve of his power,
So seems he in state—
    As tall as a flower:

As a rose overtowering
    The ranks of the rest
That beneath it lie cowering,
    Less bright than their best

And his hands are as sunny
    As ruddy ripe corn
Or the browner-hued honey
    From heather-bells borne.

When summer sits proudest,
    Fulfilled with its mirth,
And rapture is loudest
    In air and on earth,

The suns of all hours
    That have ripened the roots
Bring forth not such flowers
    And beget not such fruits.

And well though I know it,
    As fain would I write,
Child, never a poet
    Could praise you aright.

I bless you? the blessing
    Were less than a jest
Too poor for expressing;
    I come to be blest,

With humble and dutiful
    Heart, from above:
Bless me, O my beautiful
    Innocent love!

This rhyme in your praise
    With a smile was begun;
But the goal of his ways
    Is uncovered to none,

Nor pervious till after
    The limit impend;
It is not in laughter
    These rhymes of you end.

SPRING, and fall, and summer, and winter,
    Which may Earth love least of them all,
Whose arms embrace as their signs imprint her,
    Summer, or winter, or spring, or fall?

The clear-eyed spring with the wood-birds mating,
    The rose-red summer with eyes aglow,
The yellow fall with serene eyes waiting,
    The wild-eyed winter with hair all snow?

Spring’s eyes are soft, but if frosts benumb her
    As winter’s own will her shrewd breath sting:
Storms may rend the raiment of summer,
    And fall grow bitter as harsh-lipped spring.

One sign for summer and winter guides me,
    One for spring, and the like for fall:
Whichever from sight of my friend divides me,
    That is the worst ill season of all.

WORSE than winter is spring
If I come not to sight of my king:
But then what a spring will it be
When my king takes homage of me!

I send his grace from afar
Homage, as though to a star;
As a shepherd whose flock takes flight
May worship a star by night.

As a flock that a wolf is upon
My songs take flight and are gone:
No heart is in any to sing
Aught but the praise of my king.

Fain would I once and again
Sing deeds and passions of men:
But ever a child’s head gleams
Between my work and my dreams.

Between my hand and my eyes
The lines of a small face rise,
And the lines I trace and retrace
Are none but those of the face.

TILL the tale of all this flock of days alike
            All be done,
Weary days of waiting till the month’s hand strike
            Thirty-one,
Till the clock’s hand of the month break off, and end
            With the clock,
Till the last and whitest sheep at last be penned
            Of the flock,
I their shepherd keep the count of night and day
            With my song,
Though my song be, like this month which once was May,
            All too long.

THE incarnate sun, a tall strong youth,
    On old Greek eyes in sculpture smiled:
But trulier had it given the truth
    To shape him like a child.

No face full-grown of all our dearest
    So lightens all our darkness, none
Most loved of all our hearts hold nearest
    So far outshines the sun,

As when with sly shy smiles that feign
    Doubt if the hour be clear, the time
Fit to break off my work again
    Or sport of prose or rhyme,

My friend peers in on me with merry
    Wise face, and though the sky stay dim
The very light of day, the very
    Sun’s self comes in with him.

OUT of sight,
    Out of mind!
Could the light
    Prove unkind?

Can the sun
    Quite forget
What was done
    Ere he set?

Does the moon
    When she wanes
Leave no tune
    That remains

In the void
    Shell of night
Overcloyed
    With her light?

Must the shore
    At low tide
Feel no more
    Hope or pride,

No intense
    Joy to be,
In the sense
    Of the sea—

In the pulses
    Of her shocks
It repulses,
    When its rocks

Thrill and ring
    As with glee?
Has my king
    Cast off me,

Whom no bird
    Flying south
Brings one word
    From his mouth?

Not the ghost
    Of a word
Riding post
    Have I heard,

Since the day
    When my king
Took away
    With him spring,

And the cup
    Of each flower
Shrivelled up
    That same hour,

With no light
    Left behind.
Out of sight,
    Out of mind!

BECAUSE I adore you
    And fall
On the knees of my spirit before you—
    After all,

You need not insult,
    My king,
With neglect, though your spirit exult
    In the spring,

Even me, though not worth,
    God knows,
One word of you sent me in mirth,
    Or one rose

Out of all in your garden
    That grow
Where the frost and the wind never harden
    Flakes of snow,

Nor ever is rain
    At all,
But the roses rejoice to remain
    Fair and tall—

The roses of love,
    More sweet
Than blossoms that rain from above
    Round our feet,

When under high bowers
    We pass,
Where the west wind freckles with flowers
    All the grass.

But a child’s thoughts bear
    More bright
Sweet visions by day, and more fair
    Dreams by night,

Than summer’s whole treasure
    Can be:
What am I that his thought should take pleasure,
    Then, in me?

I am only my love’s
    True lover,
With a nestful of songs, like doves
    Under cover,

That I bring in my cap
    Fresh caught,
To be laid on my small king’s lap—
    Worth just nought

Yet it haply may hap
    That he,
When the mirth in his veins is as sap
    In a tree,

Will remember me too
    Some day
Ere the transit be thoroughly through
    Of this May—

Or perchance, if such grace
    May be,
Some night when I dream of his face,
    Dream of me.

Or if this be too high
    A hope
For me to prefigure in my
    Horoscope,

He may dream of the place
    Where we
Basked once in the light of his face,
    Who now see

Nought brighter, not one
    Thing bright,
Than the stars and the moon and the sun,
    Day nor night

        DAY by darkling day,
        Overpassing, bears away
Somewhat of the burden of this weary May.

        Night by numbered night,
        Waning, brings more near in sight
Hope that grows to vision of my heart’s delight

        Nearer seems to burn
        In the dawn’s rekindling urn
Flame of fragrant incense, hailing his return.

        Louder seems each bird
        In the brightening branches heard
Still to speak some ever more delightful word.

        All the mists that swim
        Round the dawns that grow less dim
Still wax brighter and more bright with hope of him,

        All the suns that rise
        Bring that day more near our eyes
When the sight of him shall clear our clouded skies.

        All the winds that roam
        Fruitful fields or fruitless foam
Blow the bright hour near that brings his bright face home,

I HEAR of two far hence
    In a garden met,
And the fragrance blown from thence
    Fades not yet.

The one is seven years old,
    And my friend is he:
But the years of the other have told
    Eighty-three.

To hear these twain converse
    Or to see them greet
Were sweeter than softest verse
    May be sweet.

The hoar old gardener there
    With an eye more mild
Perchance than his mild white hair
    Meets the child.

I had rather hear the words
    That the twain exchange
Than the songs of all the birds
    There that range,

Call, chirp, and twitter there
    Through the garden-beds
Where the sun alike sees fair
    Those two heads,

And which may holier be
    Held in heaven of those
Or more worth heart’s thanks to see
    No man knows.

OF such is the kingdom of heaven.
    No glory that ever was shed
From the crowning star of the seven
    That crown the north world’s head,

No word that ever was spoken
    Of human or godlike tongue,
Gave ever such godlike token
    Since human harps were strung.

No sign that ever was given
    To faithful or faithless eyes
Showed ever beyond clouds riven
    So clear a Paradise.

Earth’s creeds may be seventy times seven
    And blood have denied each creed:
If of such be the kingdom of heaven,
    It must be heaven indeed

THE wind on the downs is bright
    As though from the sea:
And morning and night
    Take comfort again with me.

He is nearer to-day,
    Each night to each morning saith,
Whose return shall revive dead May
    With the balm of his breath.

The sunset says to the moon,
    He is nearer to-night
Whose coming in June
    Is looked for more than the light.

Bird answers to bird,
    Hour passes the sign on to hour,
And for joy of the bright news heard
    Flower murmurs to flower.

The ways that were glad of his feet
    In the woods that he knew
Grow softer to meet
    The sense of his footfall anew.

He is near now as day,
    Says hope to the new-born light:
He is near now as June is to May,
    Says love to the night.

GOOD things I keep to console me
    For lack of the best of all,
A child to command and control me,
    Bid come and remain at his call

Sun, wind, and woodland and highland,
    Give all that ever they gave:
But my world is a cultureless island,
    My spirit a masterless slave.

And friends are about me, and better
    At summons of no man stand:
But I pine for the touch of a fetter,
    The curb of a strong king’s hand.

Each hour of the day in her season
    Is mine to be served as I will:
And for no more exquisite reason
    Are all served idly and ill

By slavery my sense is corrupted,
    My soul not fit to be free:
I would fain be controlled, interrupted,
    Compelled as a thrall may be.

For fault of spur and of bridle
    I tire of my stall to death:
My sail flaps joyless and idle
    For want of a small child’s breath.

WHITER and whiter
    The dark lines grow,
And broader opens and brighter
    The sense of the text below.

Nightfall and morrow
    Bring nigher the boy
Whom wanting we want not sorrow,
    Whom having we want no joy.

Clearer and clearer
    The sweet sense grows
Of the word which hath summer for hearer,
    The word on the lips of the rose.

Duskily dwindles
    Each deathlike day,
Till June realising rekindles
    The depth of the darkness of May.

“In his bright radiance and collateral light
Must I be comforted, not in his sphere.”

STARS in heaven are many,
    Suns in heaven but one:
Nor for man may any
    Star supplant the sun.

Many a child as joyous
    As our far-off king
Meets as though to annoy us
    In the paths of spring.

Sure as spring gives warning,
    All things dance in tune:
Sun on Easter morning,
    Cloud and windy moon,

Stars between the tossing
    Boughs of tuneful trees.
Sails of ships recrossing
    Leagues of dancing seas;

Best, in all this playtime,
    Best of all in tune,
Girls more glad than Maytime,
    Boys more bright than June;

Mixed with all those dances,
    Far through field and street
Sing their silent glances,
    Ring their radiant feet.

Flowers wherewith May crowned us
    Fall ere June be crowned:
Children blossom round us
    All the whole year round.

Is the garland worthless
    For one rose the less,
And the feast made mirthless?
    Love, at least, says yes.

Strange it were, with many
    Stars enkindling air,
Should but one find any
    Welcome: strange it were,

Had one star alone won
    Praise for light from far:
Nay, love needs his own one
    Bright particular star.

Hope and recollection
    Only lead him right
In its bright reflection
    And collateral light.

Find as yet we may not
    Comfort in its sphere:
Yet these days will weigh not
    When it warms us here;

When full-orbed it rises,
    Now divined afar:
None in all the skies is
    Half so good a star;

None that seers importune
    Till a sign be won:
Star of our good fortune,
    Rise and reign, our sun!

I PASS by the small room now forlorn
    Where once each night as I passed I knew
A child’s bright sleep from even to morn
    Made sweet the whole night through.

As a soundless shell, as a songless nest,
    Seems now the room that was radiant then
And fragrant with his happier rest
    Than that of slumbering men.

The day therein is less than the day,
    The night is indeed night now therein:
Heavier the dark seems there to weigh,
    And slower the dawns begin.

As a nest fulfilled with birds, as a shell
    Fulfilled with breath of a god’s own hymn,
Again shall be this bare blank cell,
    Made sweet again with him.

SPRING darkens before us,
    A flame going down,
With chant from the chorus
    Of days without crown—
Cloud, rain, and sonorous
    Soft wind on the down.

She is wearier not of us
    Than we of the dream
That spring was to love us
    And joy was to gleam
Through the shadows above us
    That shift as they stream.

Half dark and half hoary,
    Float far on the loud
Mild wind, as a glory
    Half pale and half proud
From the twilight of story,
    Her tresses of cloud;

Like phantoms that glimmer
    Of glories of old
With ever yet dimmer
    Pale circlets of gold
As darkness grows grimmer
    And memory more cold.

Like hope growing clearer
    With wane of the moon,
Shines toward us the nearer
    Gold frontlet of June,
And a face with it dearer
    Than midsummer noon.

You send me your love in a letter,
    I send you my love in a song:
Ah child, your gift is the better,
    Mine does you but wrong.

No fame, were the best less brittle,
    No praise, were it wide as earth,
Is worth so much as a little
    Child’s love may be worth.

We see the children above us
    As they might angels above:
Come back to us, child, if you love us,
    And bring us your love.

No time for books or for letters:
    What time should there be?
No room for tasks and their fetters:
    Full room to be free.

The wind and the sun and the Maytirne
    Had never a guest
More worthy the most that his playtime
    Could give of its best.

If rain should come on, peradventure,
    (But sunshine forbid!)
Vain hope in us haply might venture
    To dream as it did.

But never may come, of all comers
    Least welcome, the rain,
To mix with his servant the summer’s
    Rose-garlanded train!

He would write, but his hours are as busy
    As bees in the sun,
And the jubilant whirl of their dizzy
    Dance never is done.

The message is more than a letter,
    Let love understand,
And the thought of his joys even better
    Than sight of his hand.

                WIND, high-souled, full-hearted
                    South-west wind of the spring!
                Ere April and earth had parted,
                    Skies, bright with thy forward wing,
Grew dark in an hour with the shadow behind it, that bade not a bird dare sing.

                Wind whose feet are sunny,
                    Wind whose wings are cloud,
                With lips more sweet than honey
                    Still, speak they low or loud,
Rejoice now again in the strength of thine heart: let the depth of thy soul wax proud.

                We hear thee singing or sighing,
                    Just not given to sight,
                All but visibly flying
                    Between the clouds and the light,
And the light in our hearts is enkindled, the shadow therein of the clouds put to flight.

                From the gift of thine hands we gather
                    The core of the flowers therein,
                Keen glad heart of heather,
                    Hot sweet heart of whin,
Twin breaths in thy godlike breath close blended of wild spring’s wildest of kin.

                All but visibly beating
                    We feel thy wings in the far
                Clear waste, and the plumes of them fleeting,
                    Soft as swan’s plumes are,
And strong as a wild swan’s pinions, and swift as the flash of the flight of a star.

                As the flight of a planet enkindled
                    Seems thy far soft flight
                Now May’s reign has dwindled
                    And the crescent of June takes light
And the presence of summer is here, and the hope of a welcomer presence in sight.

                Wind, sweet-souled, great-hearted
                    Southwest wind on the wold!
                From us is a glory departed
                    That now shall return as of old,
Borne back on thy wings as an eagle’s expanding, and crowned with the sundawn’s gold.

                There is not a flower but rejoices,
                    There is not a leaf but has heard:
                All the fields find voices,
                    All the woods are stirred:
There is not a nest but is brighter because of the coming of one bright bird.

                Out of dawn and morning,
                    Noon and afternoon,
                The sun to the world gives warning
                    Of news that brightens the moon;
And the stars all night exult with us, hearing of joy that shall come with June.