1837-1920
817 Earliest Spring
TOSSING his mane of snows in wildest eddies and
tangles,
Lion-like March cometh in, hoarse, with tempestuous
breath,
Through all the moaning chimneys, and ’thwart all the
hollows and angles [death.
Round the shuddering
house, threating of winter and
But in my heart I feel the life of the wood and the meadow
Thrilling the pulses that own kindred with
fibres that lift
Bud and blade to the sunward, within the inscrutable shadow,
Deep in the oak’s chill core,
under the gathering drift.
Nay, to earth’s life in mine some prescience, or dream, or
desire [goes—
(How shall I name it aright?)
comes for a moment and
Rapture of life ineffable, perfect—as if in the brier,
Leafless there by my door,
trembled a sense of the rose.