APRIL.
From the French of Remy Belleau.
April! sweet month, the daintiest of all.
Fair thee befall:
April! fond hope of fruits that lie
In buds of swathing cotton wrapt,
There closely lapt
Nursing their tender infancy—
April! that dost thy yellow, green, and blue,
Around thee strew,
When, as thou go’st, the grassy floor
Is with a million flowers depaint,
Whose colours quaint
Have diaper’d the meadows o’er—
April! at whose glad coming zephyrs rise
With whisper’d sighs,
Then on their light wings brush away,
And hang amid the woodlands fresh
Their aery mesh,
To tangle Flora on her way—
April! it is thy hand that doth unlock,
From plain and rock,
Odours and hues, a balmy store,
That breathing lie on Nature’s breast,
So richly blest,
That earth or heaven can ask no more—
April! thy blooms, amid the tresses laid
Of my sweet maid,
Adown her neck and bosom flow;
And in a wild profusion there,
Her shining hair
With them hath blent a golden glow—
April! the dimpled smiles, the playful grace,
That in the face
Of Cytherea haunt, are thine:
And thine the breath, that, from the skies,
The deities
Inhale, an offering at thy shrine—
’Tis thou that dost with summons blythe and soft,
High up aloft,
From banishment these heralds bring.
These swallows, that along the air
Send swift, and bear
Glad tidings of the merry spring.
April! the hawthorn and the eglantine,
Purple woodbine,
Streak’d pink, and lily-cup and rose,
And thyme, and marjoram, are spreading,
Where thou art treading,
And their sweet eyes for thee unclose.