[SPRING]
The sun crept into the peaceful earth
And troubled her dream of fair content;
He tempted the timorous blossoms to birth,
The poor pink fools that laughing went
Naked to meet him, their leaves without,
And the meddlesome bees droned round and about.
The sober grey that shrouded the head
Of the pensive sea he ravished away;
He twitched it from her, and gave instead
The libertine breezes who ruffle her day;
Who tease and tousle and toss anew
Her mourning garment of exquisite blue.
He cozened the mud-flies out on the heath,
Ephemeral butterflies opened their wings;
The credulous birds from their mates beneath
Caught up the catch that Eternity sings—
Sings to the Echoes in Fools' Paradise—
"Shall not our folly befool the wise?"
April 1903.
[REPLY TO MRS. JOWITT]
WHO SENT ME A PIECE OF GOOD NEWS IN A RHYMED LETTER
Wittering, April 1915
When all the world was very good
(So says the nursery rhyme)
The fairy Fays and Mays who stood
As godmothers, from time to time,
Would give their virtuous picaninnies
A golden goblet filled with guineas.
That was the golden age: and nurse
Declared that ours grew worse and worse
("Don't bite the spoon, Miss Leslie!")
Yet I believe that fairies still
Can fill a cup, and over-fill,—
At any rate in Chelsea.
Telling good news is reckoned kind
(Except when Germans tell it,)
To wrap it in a pleasant rind
Of song was thought angelic
By the good shepherds, and by me
A piece of sweet diablerie.
One cavil: though it ill becomes
One who has in his time
Bedragged the depths and skimmed the scums
To catch a dubious rhyme,
To scold a poetess who fell
And, though she knew she shouldn't,
Wrote down a name that rhymed with "well"
Instead of one that wouldn't,
Yet, frankly, tuneful, erring sister,
Can one be musical to "Mister"?
A monosyllable, I confess,
Is what the Muse prefers:
She cut a queen's name down to Bess
And yours is worse than hers:
Meanwhile it takes a better poet
Than I to deal with Mrs. Jowitt.