| |
| THE SUNLIGHT fills the trembling air, | |
| And balmy days their guerdons bring; | |
| The Earth again is young and fair, | |
| And amorous with musky Spring. | |
| |
| The golden nurslings of the May | 5 |
| In splendor strew the spangled green, | |
| And hues of tender beauty play, | |
| Entangled where the willows lean. | |
| |
| Mark how the rippled currents flow; | |
| What lustres on the meadows lie! | 10 |
| And hark! the songsters come and go, | |
| And trill between the earth and sky. | |
| |
| Who told us that the years had fled, | |
| Or borne afar our blissful youth? | |
| Such joys are all about us spread; | 15 |
| We know the whisper was not truth. | |
| |
| The birds that break from grass and grove | |
| Sing every carol that they sung | |
| When first our veins were rich with love, | |
| And May her mantle round us flung. | 20 |
| |
| O fresh-lit dawn! immortal life! | |
| O Earth’s betrothal, sweet and true, | |
| With whose delights our souls are rife, | |
| And aye their vernal vows renew! | |
| |
| Then, darling, walk with me this morn; | 25 |
| Let your brown tresses drink its sheen; | |
| These violets, within them worn, | |
| Of floral fays shall make you queen. | |
| |
| What though there comes a time of pain | |
| When autumn winds forebode decay? | 30 |
| The days of love are born again; | |
| That fabled time is far away! | |
| |
| And never seemed the land so fair | |
| As now, nor birds such notes to sing, | |
| Since first within your shining hair | 35 |
| I wove the blossoms of the spring. | |
| |
