And I said, “We have walked in vain!
To find but this shivering bud,
Weighed down with its weight of rain,
Crouched here in the wild March wood.”
But she said, “Though the day be sad,
And the skies be dark with fate,
There is always something glad
That will help our hearts to wait.
“Look, now, at this beautiful thing,
In this wood’s wild hollow curled!
’Tis a promise of joy and spring,
And of love, to the waiting world.
“Ah, the sinless Earth is fair,
And man’s are the sin and the gloom—
Come, bury the days that were,
And look to’ard the days to come!”
. . . . . . . . . .
And the May came on with her charms,
With twinkle and rustle of feet;
Blooms stormed from her luminous arms
And songs that were wildly sweet.
Now I think of her words that day,
This day that I longed so to see,
That finds her dead with the May,
And my life but a withered tree.
IN AUTUMN
I
Sunflowers wither and lilies die,
Poppies are pods of seeds;
The first red leaves on the pathway lie,
Like blood of a heart that bleeds.
Weary alway will it be to-day,
Weary and wan and wet;
Dawn and noon will the clouds hang gray,
And the autumn wind will sigh and say,
“He comes not yet, not yet,
Weary alway, alway!”